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Chapter Text

Chapter 1
March 1, 2009

The sound of Joe Johnson’s cries came through the monitor sitting on Steve’s nightstand at 5:30am.  Still in a state of sleep, he reached over and started fumbling with the clock, then started banging on it with the palm of his hand. 

“Are you trying to snooze our son, Steve?” Kayla called out sleepily.

Returning to the here and now, Steve opened his eye and saw the monitor’s red lights glow in unison with his son’s cries.  “The Johnson Family alarm clock strikes again, Sweetness,” he said groggily, “right on schedule.”

“I’ll go,” Kayla said as she tried to get out of bed. 

“Oh no you don’t.  You’ve only been home two days.  That was open heart surgery, Kayla, what are you thinkin’?”

“I’m thinking I haven’t seen much of my baby in those six days and really want to go get him.”  But the burn of the incision made itself known as soon as she tried to shift her body to a sitting position.  “Ooh,” she moaned in pain. “Maybe, ah – maybe you can bring Joe to me?  My breasts are killing me.”

“Yeah, they’re killin’ me too, baby,” Steve said with a sleepy grin.  Kayla smiled feeling slightly shy.  “You get his breakfast ready,” he said as he gently palmed her breast over her top, “and I’ll go get our little dude.”  Steve raised his eyebrow with a playful leer, feeling the weight of her milk-swollen breast as he placed a morning kiss on her cheek.

Kayla had been released from the hospital two days ago after having been accidentally shot by Hope.  While Hope was still feeling the guilt almost a week later, she ultimately saved Kayla’s life before the Mayor’s killer tried to strangle the life out of her.  Kayla wanted nothing more than to bound out of that bed and breastfeed her infant son, but the incision from her open heart surgery to dig out the bullet that had lodged there slowed her down.  It did not, however, slow down her milk production, and this morning she was engorged.  For a week, Kayla had to pump and dump so as not to pass on any of the drugs in her body to Joe.  Today, she was narcotic-free and finally able to feed her baby, again.  She cherished this time, as she was stuck in prison when Stephanie was an infant and never really had this opportunity with her.

Kayla sat herself up in bed and smiled as Steve appeared in their bedroom doorway holding their baby boy. It was the most beautiful thing Kayla had ever seen in her life.  Her husband – her soulmate – holding their baby in his arms and looking at her like they were the only ones in the whole world.  Kayla held out her arms and made a gimme motion with her hands.  “Good morning, Baby!” Kayla cooed in her higher register, a smile spread across her face.  Joey made a high-pitched scream of excitement to see his mommy.  Kayla kissed his belly and nuzzled his neck, breathing in the scent of freshly changed baby.  “Someone has a new diaper!” she said to him.  “What a good papa you have.”  Kayla raised her pajama top and cradled Joey to her left breast. The baby latched right on, and Kayla let out a moan of relief, “Ungh, thank God,” she said.

Steve slipped back in bed putting his left arm around her and adjusted her so that she could lean her back against him.  Kayla laid her head back into the crook of his neck and sighed while Steve’s right hand reached around to hold Joey’s foot.  

“How’re you doin’, Sweetness, still sore today?”

“Yeah.  Getting better, though,” Kayla said.  “Still burns a little, but once I get moving the pain will even out. It’s always worse in the morning when the skin hasn’t moved for so long.”

“I remember,” Steve said as he instinctively adjusted his patch, referring to his own surgeries he’d endured where his left eye had once been.”  Kayla reached up to place comforting strokes along Steve’s face, gently curling her fingers into his beard as he kissed the top of her head. 

Kayla dropped her hand back down, placing it on Steve’s thigh as he went back to caressing the bottom of his baby boy’s foot with his thumb.  They stayed like that for several minutes, basking in this family moment with an appreciation most couples took for granted.  Steve loved them and Stephanie with his entire being, and Kayla felt that love like a warm bath as she lay against him, passing on that love and her own to her suckling baby.

When Joey began to fuss, she gently switched arms, careful not to rub against her sizeable incision, and put the baby to her right breast.  Steve kissed her, then kissed Joe’s head, and said, “I’m gonna jump in the shower.  You ok here?” 

“Oh, we’re fine,” she said with a relaxed smile.

Ten minutes later, Steve emerged from the bathroom to find Kayla had swung her legs to a sitting position on the side of the bed.  She was pulling down her pajama top, as Joe was finally satiated.  “Little dude’s taken my job,” Steve said with mock jealousy.

Kayla reached out a hand, and Steve helped her up.  “Oh, I think your job is safe, Steve,” she assured him.  Then felt a pang of irrational doubt and added, “if you – ah – still want it.”

She placed Joe in his pack and play in their bedroom.  Steve said, “If I still want it?  Baby, I might be sharing those breasts temporarily, but they’re still mine,” he smiled.  But that smile waned as he saw her tense up and become uncomfortable.  “Are you being serious?  What’s going on in that head of yours?”

“Nothing.  It’s just …” she trailed off, looking away from him.

Steve caught her chin and tilted her face up to look at her.  “It’s not nothing, Kayla.  What is it?”

She looked down and placed a hand on her sternum.  It – it won’t be … the same.  This incision is not sexy, and … and it’s going to leave a big scar.  I can hide it out there,” she motioned out the window, “but I can’t hide it in here,” she said, her eyes darting around nervously.  “I’m a doctor, and in my head I know better.  But in my heart, inside, I’m just feeling like a woman, like a wife.  And my body – my breasts – will be different, now.”

Steve couldn’t believe what he was hearing.  “Kayla.  Are you kiddin’ me?  You do remember who you’re talkin’ to, don’t you?”  This is me, your one-eyed tomcat.  You’ve never seen the big gaping scar that used to be my eye.  In all these years, you’ve never seen that; you’ve only seen me.  Why should I be any different?  I will never see that scar, I’m only gonna see you, Sweetness.  Of all the people in this world, I am the last one you should feel insecure with.  I love you.  You are the most beautiful woman I’ve ever seen, before and after this scar.”

Kayla didn’t say anything. She was feeling conflicted, knowing that what he said was true but feeling somehow damaged anyway.  Steve saw her doubt and stroked her cheek.  When he let his hand slip down to caress her neck, she self-consciously put her hand up to her collar. 

Steve looked at her meaningfully.  “Don’t.  Don’t do that, Kayla.”  She dropped her hands to her sides as he held her gaze.  Then he began to unbutton her pajama top.

“Steve, no.”

“Let me look at you, Kayla.  I want to see you.”

“I don’t want you to see me.  Please.”

“Kayla, do you think I haven’t seen it yet?  I’m your husband, I barely left that hospital room, and I’ve been taking care of you for the last two days.  I’ve seen your incision.

“But you’ve seen it clinically, observationally.  You haven’t seen it as a man who wants to make love to his wife. Who wants to put his mouth on his wife.  You haven’t seen it in the way I know you’re feeling right now.”

“That’s not true.”

“No?” she asked doubtfully.

“No.” he replied with conviction.  “Kayla, I always want to make love to you.  When I’m with you, I want you.  When I’m not with you, I want you. And when I’m with you but can’t have you, I still want you.”

Kayla gave him a sideways glance that hinted at the playful.

“Well, ok, when the Bears are killing the Packers, I may not have my eyes on the prize, so to speak, but somewhere in that head of mine, I’m always thinking husbandly thoughts of you and not like someone just changing your bandages. 

Steve reached over again and undid her top pajama button.  “Baby, that scar means nothing to me,” he said as he undid the second.  “And I don’t want you ever thinking anything different again.”  He undid the next two, and Kayla started to feel naked even before he’d finished.  He’d dropped his eyes, and she watched him watch himself as he unbuttoned the final two buttons.  He looked into her nervous, face as she blushed before his eyes.  “Can I please look at you, baby?”  Kayla’s face was so apprehensive as she, nevertheless, nodded.

Steve parted her top, and he gazed upon once tightly pulled sutures that were now loosened as the skin knitted together and had started to heal.  Rather than a neat slice, the skin was lumpy and bright pink all the way from right between her breasts to just below her ribcage.

“I take it back,” Steve said, “It doesn’t mean nothing to me; this scar means everything to me.  I love this scar.  This scar is what bought you back to me.”  He leaned down and kissed the very top stitch with the gentlest of feathery kisses. Kayla tensed with insecurity, but she didn’t turn away. “This scar is what saved your life, Kayla.”  And he kissed the next stitch just as gently.  “I owe my life to this beautiful scar,” and kissed the next stitch.  “Because I wouldn’t want to live if I didn’t have you with me,” while kissing the one below it. “I love your scar, Kayla. It’s why I have this breast to kiss,” as he kissed her left breast, “and this one to kiss,” and did the same to the right one. 

Kayla let tears filled with love and adoration for her husband spill down her face as he kissed the next stitch, then the next, then the one below that.  Her apprehension and self-doubt was melting away. “Baby, other than you, Stephanie, and Joey, there is nothing in this world I love more,” kissing the next stitch, “than this,” and the next one, “beautiful,” then the next, “scar.”

By now Steve was on his knees and kissed her final stitch.  He then lowered the waistband of her pajama bottoms and playfully licked her navel.  “This belly button’s not bad, either,” he winked up at her.  

Kayla looked down at him and said, “You are an amazing man, Steve Johnson.  I thank God every day for bringing you back to me.”

Steve stood up and held her, cradling her head against his chest as he slowly swayed her to the sounds of music that only they could hear.  “Me, too, baby.  Me, too.”

Chapter Text

Find Me
Chapter 2

The next two weeks were spent healing and enjoying more family time than they’d ever had before.  Kayla spent every able-bodied moment taking care of Joe, feeding him, changing his diapers, giving him tummy time on the floor, and watching him grab with gleeful abandon at the little animals hanging from his baby gym.  At first, she’d have to hand him off to Steve and Stephanie quite a bit when she inevitably needed rest.  As a doctor, she knew that this kind of surgery was a significant trauma to the body and that it would tire easily as a natural part of healing.  Even so, it frustrated her to no end.  Through this bizarre series of events, Kayla had her husband, her daughter, and her son all under the same roof, and she just wanted to be with them.  She wanted to enjoy every moment of every day with her family, so rare it was for them to be all together like this.  In fact, they had never been all together like this.  So, Kayla savored every moment, aggravated at the limitations of her own body.

Even so, Steve watched as Kayla took delight in them all.  Each day, as her soreness ebbed and her strength returned, he saw the fulfillment sparkle in her eyes.  The mornings began the same way every day.  Steve went in to get Joey up, changed his diaper, brought him in to Kayla in bed, and held them both as the baby would nurse.  Then they would have a morning outing.  Sometimes it was the park, sometimes the coffee shop, one day they went to the aquarium.  Some days they’d just take long rides in the car.  By the time they got home for lunch and Joe nursed again, both he and his mother would succumb to the naps his little body and her healing one insisted on.  The afternoons were filled with board books, tummy time, binkies, and the multiple wardrobe changes that babies seem to necessitate.  It was mundane parenthood 101, and Steve and Kayla reveled in it.

Most days Stephanie would work, but she was able to join them for a handful of morning outings, and she always came home to her parents’ apartment for dinner.  That was the most precious time for Kayla, having all four of them around the table eating the dinner that Steve cooked for them.  They talked about their days and laughed, and the love they all shared was like an enveloping cloud that had settled over just the four of them each night at that table.  The Johnson family had never experienced this kind of togetherness, this kind of normalcy, for such a long stretch.  It was everything Kayla had ever wanted, and her joy fed their spirits.  In all the time he’d known her, he had never seen Kayla so happy. 

And that’s how Steve wanted to keep her.

One day, on her third week of administrative sick leave, Kayla turned to clear the last of the dishes from the dinner table to see Steve watching her with tears in his eyes.  Concern hit her immediately. 

“Steve?  What’s the matter?” Kayla asked.

“The matter?  Nothing, Sweetness.  Nothing’s the matter.”

“Steve,” she said.  “Tell me.”

“I’m just happy, baby.  ‘Cause I’ve never seen you so happy.”

She smiled at this and walked over to him, wrapping her arms around his waist, careful not to drip soapy hands on him.  “I am,” she said as she lay her head on his chest.  “I feel wonderful having you three around me all the time.  I got you back –“

“—Twice,” Steve jibed.

“Yes,” she chuckled, “twice.  And I’m just happy.  I always knew it could be like this, and now that it is, I am just the luckiest woman in the world.”

Steve leaned his face down to her and kissed her sweetly, then another peck on the forehead.  Suddenly he realized that Kayla had been on her feet a while doing the dishes. “Ya know, you really shouldn’t overdo it, Sweetness,” nodding toward the sink. 

“Actually, I’m feeling pretty good.  Pretty well healed at this point.  I mean, I’m still a little sore in the mornings, but most of the time there’s really no more pain.  I’m just tiring out here and there.”

Steve gave her a hesitant look.

“Really, Steve.  Honestly, I’m fine.”

“You’re doin’ ok, then?”

“Yes, I told you, I’m fine,” she assured him with a look that begged him to stop babying her.

“Well … how fine?”

“What?”

“How fiiiine,” he said with a little shuffle across the kitchen, “do you feel?”

Kayla’s heart quickened for the first time in weeks as a knowing grin played on her lips.  “Ohhh,” she said, “I’m pretty darn fine.” 

Turning his head to see if Stephanie was still on diaper duty in the baby’s room, Steve reached up to fondle Kayla’s right breast while encircling her waist with his other arm.  As his eye drilled into hers, he said, “You’re sure now?  That you’re pretty darn fine?  ‘Cause that sounds kind of unspecific to me.”

“Too unspecific, huh?” she asked.

“Yeah, I think you’re going to have to help me out here,” he said as he brushed his thumb over her nipple that was hardening beneath her bra and t-shirt. “Can you rate the fineness?”

“Rate it?”

“Yeah.”  Steve bent down to kiss the tender flesh where her shoulder met her neck. “How fine is this nibble, on a scale of one to ten?”

“Mm … that’s – that’s an eight on the fine scale, Mr. Johnson,” she said with a smile.  She was now only vaguely aware of the soapy drips that had fallen from her hands to the shoulders of Steve’s shirt, the tingle in her belly now the only thing she was feeling.

“An eight?  Oh, Sweetness, that needs improvement.  What about this?  How fine would you rate this little squeeze?” Steve asked as he put some gentle pressure on the breast he was still holding, then moved his other hand down the small of her back, resting on the curve of her rear.

“I think that’s at least an eight and a half,” Kayla teased.

“What?”

“Nine. Ok, it’s a nine, definitely a nine on the fineness scale!”

“Baby!” he said, wounded, but leaned down to kiss her anyway, holding her no longer soapy hands.  Kayla’s passion was ignited, and she suddenly couldn’t remember the task she was trying to finish when this all started, and Steve was quickly losing himself.

“Papa!”  Stephanie’s voice loud and clear from the bedroom cut through the haze, bringing them to instant reality.

“Yeah!” he called back much too abruptly, stepping away from Kayla as if he had just been caught with his hand in the cookie jar.

“Someone forgot to replace the wippees!  Can you bring me a new box?”

“Wippees?” Steve yelled back?

“Yeah,” she called out with a duh! quality.  Ya know, it’s not fair to make the sister change poopy diapers, I really oughtta get some hazard pay, here.”

“They’re on the floor of his closet, baby girl!” yelled Kayla.

“Can someone please bring them to me? ‘Cause, hello, if I have to let go of Joe’s legs we’re gonna have a poopy emergency on the changing pad, here.”

“I really need to finish the dishes,” Kayla said with a look that promised more fineness later. 

“Comin’, Little Sweetness!” Steve yelled as he kissed Kayla’s lips.  Then he grinned at his wife and said, “Fine,” before coming through with a box of wippees for Stephanie.

An hour later, Stephanie walked into Joe’s room where Kayla was nursing him in the glider beside his crib.  It was such a beautiful sight.  She stared at her mother in such an intimate and personal moment and couldn’t help but be captivated as she stared at her brother suckling her mother’s breast just below Kayla’s t-shirt.  Kayla wasn’t embarrassed, nor did she rush for the breastfeeding cover-up.  Instead, she watched with wonder the introspective look on Stephanie’s face.  She always was ahead of her time, this sensitive girl of hers.

“Whatcha thinkin’ about baby girl?” Kayla asked her softly.

“Huh?” Stephanie replied still enraptured by the sight in front of her even though it wasn’t the first time she’d seen her brother nursing.

“What are you thinking about, Stephanie?”

“I – I just,” she stammered.  Kayla stayed silent and let her take her time.  “I just get it now, I think, Mama.  You and Papa.  And Joey.  I understand things so much differently now. I don’t think I really understood it before.  I thought I did … but I don’t think I did.”

Kayla became concerned that Stephanie was feeling like the odd man out.  But her daughter caught that instantly and continued.

“No, it’s a good!  Watching you nurse Joey, mom.  It’s … it’s beautiful.  And it’s perfect.  It’s the way you and Papa were supposed to be.”  Stephanie began to choke up with a rush of emotion.  “It’s how it was supposed to be all those years ago with me, only it all went wrong.  All those years you were separated, and all that time we didn’t have together when I was his age.  Watching you –,” she said as she began to openly cry, “—is like … it’s like I’m watching us … the way it would have been if we weren’t cheated out of what fate had planned for us.” 

“Oh, Stephanie,” Kayla whispered.

“Mama.  All my life, I’ve seen pictures of Papa. I’ve heard every story you’ve ever told more times than I could count, and I knew him so well that I could smell him and feel him and hear his voice at night when I’d dream.”  Tears spilled down Kayla’s face.  “And when he came back to us, I knew him.  He wasn’t a stranger to me.  He wasn’t.  Because you made him so real for me.  You gave me a father that I knew even before I knew him.  But it wasn’t really until you were shot and that we’ve all been home all the time together that I’ve understood it.  You and Papa together – and then also you as my parents.  Because I’m seeing you as his parents.  And I see me!  It’s like I’m witnessing our family before Papa was taken from us, when I was Joey’s age.  And I just get it.  I see the love you and Papa have for each other and for the two of us!  I’ve always known it, but these last few weeks have shown it to me.”

Kayla’s heart soared as her tears flowed. 

“Baby girl,” Kayla cried as Stephanie crouched down.  “Come here,” she said as she reached out for her.  There is nothing in this world that I love more than you and Joe and your father.  It was a difficult time for us when you were born, but the day I had you was the most joyful day in our entire lives.  You were pink and perfect, and you had your father at hello.  And he’s been devoted to you ever since.  Because you’re his—"

“Little Sweetness,” Steve said from the doorway.  “And you always will be.”

Stephanie stood up and walked into her father’s arms.  “How much did you hear?” she asked.

“Enough to make me even prouder to be your Papa than I was before.”

Stephanie smiled as Kayla wiped the tears from her cheeks.  “I love you, Papa.” She said through her happy tears.

“I love you, too,” Steve said holding her to him as he kissed the top of her head. “I only wish I could have been there for you beyond your dreams, Stephanie.”

His daughter breathed in deeply as she hugged her father, feeling the embrace she’d known her whole life, despite the fact that he hadn’t been there.  “But you were, Papa,” she said, and Steve lost the battle with the lump that had been in his throat.  She hugged her father and settled peacefully in his embrace for a bit longer.  After a few moments, she pulled back and kissed his cheek.

“So!” she took a deep breath, wiping what was left of her tears, “Chelsea and I are going out tonight, if you don’t need any more help?”

“Go ahead,” Kayla said, “have a good time.”

“I will.”

“You’re such a wonderful big sister, you know that?”

“Maybe we can talk about that hazard pay, then?” she joked.

Kayla laughed.  “Just be safe, baby girl.  See you at dinner tomorrow.”

“Ok,” Stephanie said, kissing her mother, then placing her just kissed finger on her brother’s head and finally hugging her father.  Stephanie headed for the door, then turned back.  “Love you guys.”

“We love you, too, Little Sweetness,” Steve replied.

Stephanie started away but did a quick double take and said, “Mom, you might wanna switch boobs, I think you’re out,” and sure enough, Joey had started grabbing at his mother’s chest, looking for more.

“Such a smart big sister you have, don’tcha little Joe?” Kayla cooed to her baby as she turned him.

“G’night!” she said, the sound of her voice like a doppler as she headed out the door.

“Man, she moves almost as fast as those fancy cars of hers do.”  Kayla laughed as Steve looked at her and said, “So, what was that all about?”

Kayla sighed, feeling bittersweet about her little baby that was all grown up and so very observant.  “Sometimes the truth of your life hits you when you least expect it.  Love can overwhelm you.  And … I think Stephanie had to let all that love out and share it before she burst.” 

Steve just looked into his wife’s blue eyes feeling such pride for his daughter – this beautiful person that he and Kayla made.  And whose every childhood moment he had painfully missed.

“She’s really somethin’ else, that girl of ours,” Kayla said.

“So is her Mama,” Steve replied.

At 10pm, Joe was asleep in his crib, the white noise of the baby monitor casting a comforting lull over their bedroom.  Steve stood in the middle of their bedroom wearing a pair of pajama bottoms and nothing else.  As soon as Kayla came out of the bathroom wearing a t-shirt and underwear, Steve got a hungry look in his eyes.  Kayla felt that look from the top of her head to the tips of her toes.

“You still fine, Sweetness?” Steve asked.

“I’m more than fine,” she said approaching him and placing her hands on his chest. 

“How’s your—"

“Great!” Kayla said too quickly.  “Good …,” she said with a much calmer control that she didn’t truly feel.  In fact, it was all she could do not to lick his face off.

“Kayla … Baby,” he said as he started to stroke her shoulders and upper arms.  “I’ve been goin’ crazy these past five weeks.  I mean, I’ve been so scared of hurting you, I just haven’t wanted to damage you.  But ...”

“I know.  I’ve missed being with you, too,” she said as she looked up into his eyes.  “So much” she added with a whisper.  “But I’m fine now, remember,” she asked with a grin. 

“That’s right, you are definitely fine now.”  He reached his right hand out to her face, and his touch sent a thrill through her body, electrifying her.  “Really, really fine, baby.  But I don’t know, if we’re using sixes and sevens in this conversation, then we may have some work to do.” 

“Wow, Mr. Johnson, you have some pretty high standards, there,” she said as she began to focus on Steve’s tattoo.”

“Only the best for you, Sweetness.  Only my best work.”

Kayla leaned in and placed soft kisses on his chest, and Steve moaned at the familiar feel of her on his tattoo.  “I always loved that you go for the dagger first, baby.  Why is that?”  Steve cradled the back of Kayla’s head holding her there as she bathed kisses onto the tattoo from handle to tip.

“I don’t know,” she said between smacks.  It’s strong and protective.  A little bit phallic,” she grinned.  “Exciting.”

“The tattoo excites you, baby?”

“You excite me, Steve,” then she nipped at the muscular flesh with her teeth while reaching down to stroke his already hardened penis.

“God, Sweetness,” Steve said just before he brought his lips hungrily down upon hers, the full length of his erection firm against her stomach.  They kissed with passion for the first time since her gunshot wound, and they both had a hard time controlling themselves.  Steve’s tongue reached out for the familiar comfort of Kayla’s, and the feel of her soft full lips on his drove him wild with longing.  He wove his left hand madly through her soft hair while his right arm encircled her waist, pulling her into the erection he was grinding hard against her.

Kayla whimpered her husband’s name, her arousal heating her up.  Steve tore himself from her mouth and placed hot, wet kisses down her jaw, working his way down her neck to her shoulder.  Still standing in the middle of their room, Steve grabbed Kayla’s bottom with both hands, bent his knees and brought his shaft against her center while pushing her into him.  Steve had lost control and was literally lost in both the building ecstasy throbbing between his legs, as well as the uncontainable love that swelled in his heart.  Kayla whimpered more loudly this time, and Steve pulled himself away, suddenly startled by the cry.

“Baby?” he panted, out of breath.  “Did I hurt you?”

“What?  No!  No, you didn’t hurt me, I’m ok.”

“You sure?  What was that cry of pain just now?”

Kayla pierced him with a sultry look through half-mast eyelids.  “That was need, Steve,” she said with heavy breathing of her own.  “That was want making me wet for you.  I want you,” she said as she inserted her hands into her husband’s pajama bottoms and lowered them over his rear, exposing his naked length.  “There’s nothing about you that doesn’t make me want to have you inside me. And that was me letting you know it.”

Steve stood there in silent longing at her lustful words and could not remember a time he was more turned on than he was right now. 

“I love you, baby,” he said with abandon.

“I love you, too.”

They kissed again, more gently this time.  Steve reached his hand into the waistband of his wife’s underwear and inserted his middle finger inside of her.  She rubbed against him and instantly came as Steve was still kissing her, her slick walls contracting tightly around his finger.

“Already?”

“Steve!” she moaned into his mouth.  Then “Oh … God,” as she pulled away from his mouth and buried her head in his shoulder.  He held her tightly as she rode the waves of pleasure until she fell limp against him.

“Mm,” she moaned.  “Sorry, I couldn’t help it,” she said as she desperately rubbed her hands up and down his back.

“Oh, baby, don’t be sorry, you’re beautiful when you come.  And, besides, I’m not nearly done with you yet.”

“Mm,” she giggled, “Promise?

“Oh yeah,” he said seriously as he withdrew his finger.

Steve kicked off the pajama bottoms that had been gathered at his knees, then he laced his fingers into   her underwear and pulled them down.  She stepped out of them and pulled him toward the bed.  He kissed her softly on her swollen lips as they fell to the bed, but she flinched when Steve pulled up her t-shirt to fondle her naked breasts.  She quickly sat up on the bed, pulled it back down, and looked away from him.

“Kayla,” he said with concern in his voice.  She turned her head toward him without looking.  “Kayla,” he repeated calmly as he tipped her chin toward him.  “Is this ok?”

She took a beat and then stammered, “I … I love you.”

“I know you do.  What just happened?”  But the truth was he already knew.  “You remember what I said to you about that scar?  You remember how much I love it.  I want to taste those breasts that I’ve missed so much.  No matter what your chest looks like now.”

“I know. I just … I want that, too.  I just am having a hard time …” she sighed with discomfort.  “…exposing myself.”

“Sweetness?” he asked looking directly into her eyes, his voice deep and so gentle.  “Do you want to keep your shirt on?”

She looked at him with such love for this man that understood her like no person on this earth or any other ever had before or would again.  And she didn’t have words for the love she felt for him. 

Steve waited patiently for her to answer.  After a moment, she nodded.  “Is that ok?”

“Of course, it is,” he said. 

“It won’t be forever.”

“I know,” he said smiling with knowing sadness that she felt unwhole.  “I know.”

“It doesn’t mean I don’t want to make love to you tonight, Steve – right now.  Because I do.  Which I already told you in not so many words.” Despite her best efforts a blush hit her cheeks.

In answer, he took Kayla’s hands in his own and kissed her fingertips.  Steve loved her, and he was going to give her all the time she wanted.  Steve’s hunger had abated in the moment but the thought of being inside her brought his lust back to the surface immediately.  The sadness for how she felt about herself he pushed away.  He would show her just how whole she was.

“Lay back, baby.”  She did as he instructed, “Do you trust me?”

“With my life.”

“Do you trust me to be your husband and to love you and respect you?”

“I do, baby,” she whispered with a lump in her throat.

Steve pushed up the t-shirt exposing her belly button and kissed it.  Then he trailed his mouth from there to her hip and kissed her there, as well.  He then moved from there up her side leaving a long path of moisture to just under her ribcage.  Steve moved the t-shirt aside to reveal only her right breast as he lay next her; her top half was still protected from sight by the t-shirt, while her scar peeked out just at the bottom.  Steve lowered his mouth onto the breast his son had recently emptied of nourishment and gently sucked it into his mouth.  Kayla moaned and a tear spilled down from the outside corner of her eye.  Steve continued to alternately suck and lick, telling her he loved her in between.  Kayla grabbed a fist full of Steve’s long hair, twining through it as he kissed her.  He flicked his tongue against her sensitive nipple and felt it harden with arousal.

Kayla reached down to stroke her husband’s erection, but he was on his stomach, out of her reach.  “I need to feel you. I want to touch you.” 

“Not yet,” he said.  And all she could do was lay back and let him continue his efforts, all while making her wetter with each moment.

Steve lowered her shirt. Then he crawled over her to lay beside her on the other side and did the same for her left breast, exposing only it and leaving the rest of her covered.  This breast he was less gentle with, and she started to moan loudly.

“Shh, baby, we don’t want to wake Joe.”

“I can’t help it, Steve.  I’m trying.  I – you just – Mm – drive me crazy.  I need to touch you!”

“One day I’m going to make you come just by sucking your beautiful breasts, baby.”

“I know something I could suck on,” she said. 

Steve could not ignore the provocative statement.   He pulled down her t-shirt, looked right into her eyes, and began fingering her clitoris.

“Oh, baby,” she groaned to him while his eye locked onto hers.  The look on her face was beautiful. The gorgeous arousal and lust that was only for him.  Knowing that he was the only man in this world to see her face when she was turned on and wanted nothing more than to come for him, made him so hard, he ached.

“I know something else I can suck on, too,” he said.  Steve leaned down to kiss her passionately, never stopping the strokes against her swollen bud.  Then he tore himself away, turned around, and straddled her on his knees.  Within seconds, Steve had replaced his finger with his mouth and hungrily began licking her.  He opened her folds with his fingers and lapped up the wetness that had gathered from her first orgasm.  The familiar taste of her was comforting and made him want to impale her with his hardness.  He licked and flicked her clitoris with his tongue, and sucked in all she gave him.

Kayla was lost in a sea of drunken stimulation.  She was positively on fire, and she wanted nothing more than to make her husband feel the same way; to make him come and spill his love into her.  She wasted no time when finally presented with her prize and took his full penis into her mouth from his position turned around above her.  Steve was not expecting this so fully and sucked in his breath at the feel of her warm mouth so deeply around him. 

“Kayla!” he grunted.  “Oh yeah.” 

“Now who’s the one who has to lower his voice?”

“Well, then maybe we should keep these mouths of ours busy, baby.”  And that’s just what they did.  Steve went back to licking her slickness with a rhythm that he knew would bring her to the edge, and she worked his penis into and out of her mouth until she had to take a breath.  She reached up to give a gentle squeeze to his testicles, caressing them with her thumbs, knowing vaguely that they gave life to their children.  She sucked hard as her tongue and lips danced over his penis while her arms were wrapped around his thighs.   Steve suddenly felt the familiar hurdle come and go and knew he’d erupt any second if she did not stop.

Steve gave her a final hard suck and said, “you’ve gotta stop, baby,”

“Oh, I don’t want to stop. I want you to come.”

“I need to be inside you.  It’s the first time in five weeks, I have to come inside you, baby.”

“Yes, please, Steve!”

Kayla sat up and they reversed positions so that he was laying down and she was straddling him.  She lifted up and slowly lowered herself onto him, and Steve was moved to silent awe by the love he felt course through him as he felt himself inside of the woman that meant everything to him.  Steve held onto her hips as she slowly began to rock back and forth.  Kayla began moaning her pleasure right away, and the feeling of her bottom slapping against him drove him mad with lust.  He didn’t want to come so quickly, but this felt so good, and the pleasure was so intense, that he couldn’t move her.

“Baby!  God, Kayla,” he panted. “What you do to me.  I love you so much.”

“I love you, Steve.  I love you, too.  I have never loved any other man.  It’s only you.  Oh … Steve.”

His animalistic sexual drive propelled him up.  He flipped her over gently while still connected, then supporting himself on his elbows while his hands held her head, he pumped fast and furiously in and out of her, his face in her neck, grunting with abandon.   She met his thrusts with her own, desperate to keep him inside her forever. 

“Kayla!  Kayla!”

“Oh God … Steve … Yes!  YES!” she silently shrieked. 

“Look at me,” he barely panted. “Come for me!  I want to see you when you come for me.”

“I love you …” As the waves rolled through her, her body jerked so forcefully that they tossed her like a ragdoll beneath him; so long it had been since her last release.

“My God, Kayla, you’re beautiful.”  It was the last thing he said before slipping his lower arms under her shoulders to embrace her tightly while still supporting most of his weight off her chest with his elbows and going over the edge.  His climax was strong enough that she felt him spill his pulsating fluid against her vaginal walls.  He tried not to collapse in a heap on top of her while struggling to catch his breath.  Kayla thrust against him playfully, wanting to milk as much from him as he had.

The tip of his penis was hyper-stimulated, and his body jerked in reaction.  “Oh, baby, you’re just being naughty, now, aren’t you?”

She giggled beneath him, then kissed his neck, working her way to his mouth.  They kissed gently, sweetly, but with heavy emotion for each other.  She tasted herself on his lips, and it made her love him even more.

Steve pulled back to look at her, not having moved any other part of him.  He was still inside her and didn’t want to leave her yet.  They gazed into each other’s eyes until finally Steve went to slide off her.

“Don’t,” Kayla said quickly.  “Please stay another minute.”

Steve ran the back of his hand down her cheek.  “You know we really should …” he trailed off.  “Ya know.”

“I know,” she said.  “I don’t care.  That’s why God made towels.”

Steve chuckled at that.  “That’s why God made towels, baby?  Ok, I can’t argue with that, Sweetness.”

By now Steve’s penis had begun to go back to his considerable, yet normal size, but Kayla needed him to stay on her, over her, surrounding her.  Steve noticed that something was not quite right in her expression.

“How do you feel?” he asked her.

“I feel wonderful,” she said with a coital smile of fulfillment.  I just want to keep feeling you inside me … and don’t … want you to leave.”

“Baby, where am I gonna go, I’m right here, Sweetness.”

“I can’t explain it, I just want this moment to last as long as possible.  I just want you to hold me.”

“Ok,” he said.  “I would love to hold you.  For as long as you need me to hold you.”  He looked down from on top of her and kissed her forehead. Kayla reached up a hand and adjusted his patch, which had become just slightly askew, and she knew it must be bugging him not to have done it himself yet.  He smiled down at her with love and said, “thank you.” 

“Thank you,” she said back.

“For what?” he asked.

“For loving me so much that sixteen years of hell and torture couldn’t erase me from you.

Now Steve did roll to the side of her.  He layed on his back and pulled her to tightly snuggle against him.

“Sweetness, I didn’t have a choice.  I could never forget you deep down, no matter what they did to me, you and Stephanie were the only things that kept me alive.  Even when I didn’t know you anymore, something in me knew you were who I was living for.

Kayla reached up and caressed his face.

“Stay there, baby, I’ll be right back,” Steve said.

“Where are you going, I don’t want us to get up.”

“You’ll thank me in the morning.”

Steve came from the bathroom a moment later with a towel and a warm washcloth and proceeded to clean up his wife. 

“We sure know how to make a mess, baby.”

“You’re an amazing man, Steve Johnson.  And you’re right, I probably will thank you in the morning,”

Steve quickly put down the bath towel, tossed the washcloth into the bathroom hitting the sink perfectly, and said, “nothin’ but net.” 

“What no touchdown?”

“Nah, that one was a swish, baby,” he said with a grin.  “Let me go check Joe,” then he disappeared into the next room to ensure they didn’t wake their sleeping baby.  “He’s good,” Steve said reappearing a moment later.

“Get in here,” Kayla cooed, and curled her bottom into him while he layed his head on hers. 

Kayla let out a contented sigh.  “You know, with all the struggles we’ve had to be together and be happy, I can’t regret.  I can’t say I wish. Because I’m so happy and so thankful that God brought you back to me.  That all I can see is the happiness.  I missed you and there were times I wanted to have died with you.  But I can only feel the happiness now.”

Steve was sleepy and he wished he could close his eyes feeling the same contentment that his wife felt. But he couldn’t.  “Kayla, I want to say the same, but – I do regret the years apart. I do feel cheated, and I want those sixteen years back.  But I’m thankful to have you now, for the rest of our lives. And I love you as much now as I did then.  More, if it’s possible.”

She snuggled into him, and Steve draped his leg over his wife, settling his arms around her.  He closed his eye and inhaled deeply of her scent.  The smell of his wife, the feel of her in front of him with her bottom nestled into the crook of his lap, and the feel of her hair against his cheek, all while his baby slept peacefully in the next room, made him the happiest man in the world at that moment.

“I love you, Sweetness.”

“I love you more.”

“Oh, I doubt that.”

Within seconds, tightly entwined together, Steve and Kayla fell into a deeply peaceful and dreamless sleep.

=================

The first thing Kayla became aware of as she emerged from the depths of slumber was Steve’s solid body behind her, embraced by his arms.  Her eyes still closed, she breathed in the air, and she vaguely noticed that it smelled strange.  Familiar, but not quite right.  She felt Steve behind her and nestled her rear end into his crotch, with a little moan of sleepy happiness.  The next thing she was aware of was the feel of Steve’s hand drifting over her, moving across her waist, and up to her face to settle … awkwardly … over her nose? 

He’s so out. She thought.  

At that moment, she realized as only the mother of a newborn would that the baby monitor had been turned off during the night, the white noise hum distinctly missing.  She came out of her sleepy haze with the innate parental need to go check Joey.  Even so, she dreaded leaving Steve’s warm embrace; she also wasn’t looking forward to the regular morning burn of her mostly healed incision. That’s when she realized that the pain wasn’t actually there – at all.  Not that she didn’t appreciate feeling like herself again, but Kayla’s inner doctor was confused, and alarm bells went off in her head.  Something is off here, she thought to herself.  She opened her eyes quickly and reached up to remove Steve’s hand from her face. 

Kayla had never experienced a bigger shock than the one that met her upon opening her eyes.  “Oh my God!” she screamed, as the warm blue shades of her bedroom walls were replaced by the rustic brick walls of …

… the loft.    

Chapter Text

Find Me
Chapter 3

Of all the things you expect to see when you wake up in the morning, your apartment from 20 years ago isn’t one of them.  But that’s exactly where Kayla now found herself, because that brick wall with the tall windows not 10 feet away was, without a doubt, the east wall of the loft.  The sight was so bewildering she just couldn’t help the little scream of shock.

Which, of course, caused Steve to be instantly awake.  His eye snapped open, and he yelled, “What?!  What is it?!” 

Startled by the outburst, Kayla had all but forgotten that Steve was snuggled up behind her and turned her head toward him with relief.  “Steve!” she shouted, turning back to look at him, which resulted in just as much shock as the loft did, if not more.  “Oh my God!” she yelled much louder this time.  She took a step back from him, stumbling into the coffee table, and falling backward onto the floor with a thud just as her head cracked against the coffee table.  “Ow,” she said grabbing the back of her head and squeezing her eyes shut with the contact. 

She opened her eyes to see that the loft was still there.  Yet, from her spot on the floor, Kayla just did not understand what she was seeing.  The big, green eye of her husband was staring down at her from her old peach couch with an astonished look on his face.  Only that wasn’t her husband … exactly.  Was it?  The disorientation was overwhelming, like waking up from a fever dream, not sure what time it was or how many meals you’ve missed.

“Kayla?” Steve said from his position now leaning up from his left side on the couch.  “Baby what are you ...” his voice trailing off, not quite knowing what to say.

Kayla shot to her feet and opened her mouth to say something, but no words came out.  Steve just gaped at her, his eye wide with amazement.  “Kay ... Kayla …”  And that’s all he could say before he had to tear his eye away and drag it slowly across the room while Kayla stood there in stunned stillness. 

Steve could not believe what he was seeing.  The sight that was his wife – My God, she’s so young –standing in what he immediately knew to be the loft stabbed him with a pang of nostalgia so deep that it throbbed in the pit of his stomach.  “I must have had half the bottle to end up in a dream like this.  Right down to the sweater.  I didn’t even know I remembered that one.”

“How did I get here?” Kayla asked.

“My own dream is asking me questions.  Maybe the whole bottle.”

“If this is a joke or … or a surprise or something … if you’re trying to … really, how did you do this?”

“This?”

“You – him!  This place!  It’s … amazing,” she admitted with a hesitant kind of reverence, “but it’s also weird, Ste—… it’s, ah, weird.”

Steve adjusted his patch.  “Yeah, that is weird, baby, I don’t usually dream with thing on.”

“Stop it, ok, just stop it!  Who are you?!”

“Who am I?  It’s my dream, isn’t it, who do you think I am?”

“You look like Steve, but what I’m seeing is just impossible.”

“I think that’s my line, baby, ‘cause if there’s an impossible vision, you’re it.”

“Great, now it’s creepy, too.”

Steve’s confusion was mounting.  “This dream sucks.”

Kayla had moved toward the kitchen and started to sway nervously back and forth.  Her eyes darted to various corners of the loft, eyeing the spiral staircase, the fireplace, the door, then back to the man that looked like the Steve she’d fallen in love with many years before, rather than the one she went to bed with the previous night.  “If we’re in a dream, then you’re in my dream, because I know damn well that I’m me.”  Steve sat up, his blue shirt was only partially buttoned and hung awkwardly at his shoulder from having slept in it all night.  His shift in movement caused Kayla to take a step back toward the counter.

Steve did not understand why Kayla was reacting this way toward him; in his worst nightmares, Kayla did not run from him.  So, it wasn’t until this retreat that the alarm bells finally started going off in his head.  Every impossible thing he was seeing was clearly telling him this was a dream.  Kayla looked like she did when she was 25 years old, her beautiful blonde hair in the unmistakable 1980’s style that defined a generation.  He remembered the shimmery sweater with gradients of grays and pinks she’d woken up in, though he hadn’t seen it since before he disappeared.  And her nails.  Much longer than they were yesterday.  But with every passing moment, he realized that this was not feeling like any dream he’d ever had.  This was no dull existence lived through the fuzzy lens of a brain keeping itself busy while the body rests.  This was crisp.  This was clear. He could smell the air here.  And every detail of the loft came rushing back to him as he recognized little things like the color of the phone, the smudge on the loft door, and the crack in the Formica countertop that Kayla was now gripping.   No, this was no dream. This seemed as real as the spring day that was now filled with snow that hadn’t been there when he went to bed.

“What the hell kind of dream is this?” Steve said. “Something’s not right here.”

“Ya think?” Kayla replied anxiously, rocking back and forth, and placing a frustrated hand on her head.  Then she froze.  Her hair was distinctly not hers.  She felt the wave, followed it down to discover a length she hadn’t had in a decade, and smelled the hairspray that she used to use so many years ago. 

Her stunned visage looked up at him and said, “Steve, do I look different?  Do I … do, I look younger to you? 

“You do, baby,” he said as he stood up and came toward her at the counter.  You look like an angel, Kayla.” 

“So do you,” she said, her doubt apparent.  “Different, I mean, you look so different.  Like before you went away.”  And that’s when Steve knew this wasn’t a dream.  He was going crazy again. 

“No,” Steve said with anger in his voice.  “No, this isn’t happening.  I just beat it, I’m finally back, I’m not falling back into that!”  His voice was filled with fear, yet the sound of it was like home for Kayla.  He sounded so real. Like her Steve, but the long ago one.  “Time to wake up, dude. Where’s the button I press, is there a magic word in here or somethin’?  I don’t know your magic word, Squire and Crumpets!”

As Steve started pacing around the apartment, thinking for sure he must be back in the loony bin with the thorazine cart on its way, Steve’s panic rose, his worst fears bubbling to the surface.  Fears that he wasn’t well, after all, and he was never getting his life back.  “Come on, Dimera, show me your little picture cards, bring it on, man, you just leave Kayla out of this!” he yelled to the ceiling.

This evoked a protective surge in Kayla.  She couldn’t stand to hear him believe he was insane.  She simply wasn’t going back there, and hearing those words out of his much younger mouth made her stop short.  Something was definitely very, very wrong here.  She quickly decided that not only was this not a dream, it wasn’t even a memory.  It was happening.  And while he may have looked much younger, could this somehow be her Steve, not some imposter?

Kayla walked over to him and put a steadying hand on his arm.  It felt different.  Bigger.  But doughier.  Steve was wound up, and her light touch calmed him down.  “I’m sorry I panicked,” she said.

“I don’t know, I think I might be crazy, so panicking might work out, here, Sweetness.”

The use of her pet name was enough to drive it home.  “No, you’re not!  Steve, look at me, you’re right, this isn’t a dream.  I’m real, you’re real.”

“Real young, that’s what you are, Kayla, you look … like when I met you.  Like you’re 25 years old again, baby.  That sound normal to you?”

“So do you!  You look exactly like when we met.  And look at this place.  The loft.”

“I don’t understand,” Steve said much more quietly, as if someone were, perhaps, watching them.  

“What year is it?  2009?  It’s March, right?  We just made love last night?  I was shot?”

“Not in that order.”

Kayla laughed with relief rather than mirth.  “Yes, right.  It’s me.  You’re not crazy, Steve, ‘cause if you are, then that’s both of us this time.”

“Yeah, well, maybe I do have company, then, ‘cause this is just all kinds of wrong, baby, look at this place.”

“Look at you,” Kayla whispered in wonder.  She looked at Steve and just could barely process it.  She couldn’t get over his long hair and how it fell over his sleepy right eye. 

"Look at me?  Look at you.  What is up with your hair, baby?”

“My hair,“ she rebuffed, “you should see yours, Bon Jovi!”

“Hey, I thought you liked it long.”

“I did,” Kayla chuckled. 

“Yeah, well, laugh it up, baby, I seem to remember some big hair on that head of yours.”  Not so big at the moment, it fell in soft, golden waves, framing the face that he fell in love with the minute he saw it all those years ago.

Then her gaze fell to Steve’s jeans and Kayla couldn’t resist one more playful comment in this surreal conversation that she wasn’t really convinced she was having.  “Yes, well, I should just point out your jeans.”

Steve looked down and squared his stance.  “What about my jeans?   I had these broken in so great back then.”

“Really,” she said with consummate doubt.  “You couldn’t possibly have been comfortable.”

“Are you kiddin’, these were comfy.”

“Are you sure?  Doesn’t look like a lot of room in there.”

Steve momentarily forgot to be freaked out and raised an eyebrow.  “Didn’t know you were lookin’.”

“Well your butt does look pretty good I’ll give you that,” she said with a small but sexy smile, “but I’m surprised we made babies in those.”

With the mention of babies, Steve and Kayla’s demeanor changed and their smiles dropped immediately.  “Steve,” Kayla gasped with the kind of fear that grips you at your core.

“Oh God,” Steve said, his fear matching her own.

“Where’s Joe?”

Chapter Text

Find Me
Chapter 4

Without another word, Steve and Kayla started running through the loft looking for their baby that should have been asleep in the next room.  They both started shouting his name as if the 10-month-old might wave, “over here!” 

The first place Kayla went was the small kitchen directly behind her, which took one glance to see that her baby was not there.  She saw Steve run into the guest room, which was the logical place any baby of theirs would have been.  Hearing no signs of success, she bounded up the spiral staircase to the bedroom she once shared with Steve.  Kayla’s tears flowed freely, unable to control the terror of not knowing where her child was.  Stopping abruptly at the top step, she set eyes upon her room for the first time in 20 years and was immediately assailed with the memories that came flooding back to her.  As she took in the impossible sight, she was fascinated with the feelings the details of the room evoked in her.  It was comforting and nostalgic, and she was positively terrified. 

Strong as those feelings were, they were still taking a back seat to the missing nature of Joe.  Normally she would have turned down the bed covers and opened the closet, but she was afraid to touch anything, unsure of what she’d find.  “Joe!” she yelled as she stepped down into the room.  “Baby boy?!”  She ran to the other side of the bed, dared to open her closet, and even looked in the shower and behind the toilet in the bathroom.  Of course, no reply met her desperate pleas. 

Just as Kayla turned to go out the way she’d come, she caught her visage in the bathroom mirror and did a double take.  She’d seen Steve, but the look of her own youthful face looking back at her was an even bigger shock.  Her blue eyes wide with wonder, Kayla reached up and touched her cheeks.  She felt the sensation of her own touch and was mesmerized by the feeling.  Everything inside her said she was in her 40s in 2009 with the fine wrinkles and current hairstyle to show for it.  But the woman looking back at her was in her early 20’s with nary a line on her face and hair that did not mesh with what her brain knew to be true.  She ran her hand through her hair and splayed her fingers across her breasts.  Applying a tentative squeeze, they were much smaller than the nursing breasts she’d gone to bed with and lacked the sensitive engorgement that should have been there for her son to take his morning feeding.  She then slowly pulled her collar out and looked down to her chest to see that her surgery incision was missing, as well. “What is going on?” she asked to woman in the mirror.

From his position near the couch, Steve had turned on his heel and run into the guest room, stumbling on the step he’d forgotten was there.  The memories were strong, but he pushed by them like choices on a buffet; he saw them but chose not to reach for them.  Whereas Kayla was unable to push aside that this place was completely absurd during their mad search, Steve was finely focused.  He wasn’t quite convinced he was of sound mind, but Kayla had grounded him a bit, and he was sure now that whatever this was, it wasn’t a dream.  It was clear to Steve that he went to bed with his wife in his arms and his baby in the next room, then woke up with wife was still in his arms but his baby no longer there.  So as Steve’s eye scoured every inch of every corner of the tiny guest room, his only focus was on finding Joe.  He tore the pillows from under the comforter, dropped to his belly to check under the bed, and then closed the door to look behind it.  Finding no sign of his son, he covered the short distance to the bathroom and nearly tore the shower curtain from its rod.  He tossed the entire room, his desperation increasing with every corner that Joe wasn’t found in.

Both giving up, they each headed to the fireplace area hoping to see some sign of him, which there wasn’t.  When their eyes next met, they experienced the shock of each other’s younger faces again, new waves of confusion rippling through each of them.

Kayla spoke first.  “He’s not up there.” 

“I looked everywhere, I can’t find him, either.” 

“Steve … is this really the loft?”

“Looks like it.  Everything looks exactly the same.”

“Are you sure we checked everywhere?  I mean, where could he be?”

Then Steve had a terrible thought.  “Did you look on the roof?” 

After a beat, they both ran back up the narrow stairs, and Kayla headed directly for the second small stairwell that led from the bedroom to the roof.  Steve, however, was now taking his turn to be engulfed in the memories flooding to him as he looked upon the expanse of their bedroom.  “God, Kayla,” he whispered as his green eye went wide with newfound shock.  He was briefly reminded of the day his memories came flooding back to him, though this was a different kind of feeling.  Then they were of happiness, now they were profound confusion.  But like the rest of the buffet, he passed it by and followed the woman who looked like a version of his wife up to the roof.  There they covered every square inch, including the fire escape where Steve had once watched his brother fall to the ground.  They did not find their son.

Steve was dejected as he found his way to the skylight that looked down upon their living room and settled down onto his knees.  Kayla looked on, her suspicion of him, not to mention herself, now abated.  She walked over to him, ran her hand through his hair, and breathed in the scent of her husband.  He covered her hand with his own and felt how chilled it was in this cold, dry December air.

“This is where we first made love, Sweetness.  Right in this very spot.”

“It is, isn’t it,” she said as she got down on her knees, too, meeting his gaze.  “It was a little hotter on that day.”

He gave her a sad smile.  “You look beautiful, Kayla,” he said.  “You look just as I remember you from back then.  It’s just amazing.”

“You do, too.”  She reached out to touch his young face, and Steve grabbed her hand.  He looked at it, truly inspecting it, and felt it with his thumbs.  Then pulled it to his lips and kissed it, sending a comforting warmth and love through Kayla.  Steve held her palm to his cheek and felt comfort of his own as they looked at each other and silently agreed that Joe was not here.

Steve and Kayla went back inside to take stock and figure out what was happening to them.  Kayla caught sight of the gradient gray comforter lying neatly across their bed and thought of a time she and Steve made love in that bed all day.

“Baby, we’ve gotta figure this out,” Steve said.  “Something’s happening to us, here, and it’s definitely not a dream.”

“Well, if this loft is a fake, then someone went to a lot of trouble to make it pretty perfect.  Did you see that crack in the countertop?”

“Too perfect, baby, this can’t be a set or something, this is our place.”

“But how is this possible?  We look –“

“—Like something out of science fiction, baby.  We went to bed normal and woke up in the past or somethin’.”

That hadn’t occurred to Kayla.  She thought maybe something was done to them and that maybe they were taken back to their old apartment and … and what?  Somehow magically all their old stuff appeared there right where it all used to be, oh and also, the season had changed?   No, that was ludicrous.  Then again, so was waking up 20 years younger.

Their stuff.

Steve saw the gears working in Kayla’s head.  “What are you thinking, Sweetness?”

“This stuff.  Here in our apartment.” 

Steve looked around the bedroom.  “I remember it.  I remember that brush sitting over there, and your robe laying across the bed, here.”

“That’s just it, Steve, that’s my brush.  That robe is mine.”  Her fear having ebbed to curiosity, she opened the closet again and took in the array of clothing and shoes, much of which she remembered.  She went to her dresser and opened every drawer, then went to the nightstand on Steve’s side of the bed.  “This stuff isn’t ours, Steve.  It’s mine.”  In that instant, Steve knew she was right.  Everything in the loft was hers. Even the guest room was absent of anything belonging to her onetime roommates, Diana, or Steve’s sister, Adrienne.  The only person who appeared to live here was Kayla.  “Where are we,” she asked out loud.

“I know where we are, this is the loft, Sweetness, no doubt about it,” Steve said.  “The question isn’t ‘where’ we are, Kayla.  It’s when.”

Chapter Text

Find Me
Chapter 5

Kayla cocked her head and stared at Steve like he’d grown a second head. 

“Whoa, baby,” Steve laughed without humor as he laid his hand on his chest, turning away from her slightly.  “I haven’t seen you do it like that in years.”

“Do what?”

“Get that stubborn look on your face.”

“On my—Oh, I see.”

“Yeah, on that particular face, Sweetness.”

Kayla put a hand on her blushing cheek.  “I haven’t exactly gotten used to it yet, myself.”

He put his hands tentatively on her shoulders and rubbed her arms up and down.  “I know you’re thinkin’ it’s nuts, Sweetness, but I don’t think we’re in 2009.  I think we’re back in the ‘80’s.  I remember that sweater you’re wearing.  I think.”

Kayla kept wanting to say, but how, but that seemed pointless at the moment.  She felt real, Steve definitely felt real, and with their surroundings matching their bodies, she didn’t have an explanation that sounded any less out there.  “Ok, so how do we figure out when we are – what year it is?”

“We need something with a date on it,” Steve said looking around.  He’d wished this time she hadn’t been so picked up and tidy.  They headed back down the stairs, then a thought struck him.  “Baby, we can just look at the paper.  Did you get the newspaper back then?”

“Well, I … don’t know when we are, so I don’t know!”

Steve sighed.  “I guess we could turn on the TV, maybe the news is on.” 

Just then a knock came at the loft door.  Steve and Kayla looked at each other with the same question in their eyes.  What do they do?  The last thing they expected was to see another person, but then again, they hadn’t thought much about anything beyond the confines of the actual apartment.  The first thing that came to Steve’s mind was distrust.  He looked up toward the ceiling, again as if he might catch something up there.  Kayla held her breath, afraid to be heard.  After a moment, they knocked again.  

“Answer it?” Kayla mouthed to Steve.

He shrugged then whispered, “maybe they know what year it is.”

Kayla gave him a small grin and left a still disheveled Steve at the bottom of the stairs to head for the door.  She put her first tentative grip in 20 years on the loft door handle and looked back at her husband, then slid the door open with a familiar swish.  The sight before her was a shock to say the least.

“Oh, hi honey,” Caroline greeted her daughter.

The sight of her mother with blonde hair and a face so much younger made Kayla want to weep.  “Mama?” Kayla answered?  Caroline saw immediately that something was wrong with Kayla. Why did she look at her that way, like she’d seen a ghost?  “Mom … how–how are you?”

“Holding up,” Caroline answered with a worried look in her eye.  “Listen, I thought you’d be at the house by now, so I thought I’d better come by and make sure you were alright.”  When she brushed by her daughter into the loft, Kayla could smell the same hairspray on her hair that she, herself, had also used at that time and made a side note somewhere in her head that Steve was right about the decade.

“I was, ah – I was supposed to come by?”  The sight of her mother was so comforting in this confusion, she just wanted to crawl into her arms and be held. 

“Well, yes, that’s what we all agreed last night, but you never came, it’s getting late.

Kayla looked at her wrist, but no watch.  “What time is it?” 

“Almost noon.  Your father and I were worried, so I came here, instead.”

“Well, you didn’t have to come all the way over here, Mom, why didn’t you just call my cell?”

“Your what, dear?”

“My cell … phone … ?”  Kayla realized her mistake, but Caroline was too busy being surprised at the sight of Steve loitering by the staircase to wonder what on earth Kayla was talking about.

“Patch?  What is he doing here?”

Hearing her mother call the man she’d grown to not only accept but love as a son-in-law by that unkind name brought Kayla disappointingly out of her enjoyment of the moment with her younger mother.

“His name is Steve, Mom, and I can explain.”

“You can?” Steve and Caroline said in unison.

“How could you do this,” Caroline continued, “how could you spend the night with Pa—

“Mom, please don’t do this.”

“—him at a time like this?  I hate to say this, but I'm very disappointed in you, Kayla!”

“Mrs. Brady, Steve interjected, and boy did it sound weird calling her that, “nothing happened here.  I’m sorry if we upset you.”

“No, don’t apologize, Steve, I am old enough to have a man spend the night in my own apartment if that's what I want. I am a grown woman, mother.”  Déjà vu hit Kayla with a wave that she could swear tore her stomach from her body.

“Then why don't you act like it instead of picking a man like this at a time like this?  That's not maturity!”

“Kayla,” Steve said, ignoring Caroline’s tirade, “I know when this is!  This is right before Christmas.  Marlena just ‘died.’”  Steve made air quotes with his fingers around the word “died.” “It’s 1987.”

“1986,” Caroline corrected, wondering if he’d been drinking the night before.  She looked at him now like he was a real creep, wondering why he’d make light of Marlena having died with that gesture he’d just made; because, of course, Caroline had no idea that she wasn’t really dead.  Steve ignored her, focusing only on Kayla and sussing out when they were.

“So, 1986.  Remember, baby?  I didn’t want you to be alone because I was worried that Orpheus was still out there.  You were upset, and I comforted you.  I stayed with you that night, then we woke up on the couch in these clothes, overslept.”

“Is that what you call it, young man?  Comforting?”

“Mom—"

“Why don't you come to your family for that, that's where you belong, not with—,” Caroline forced herself to stop before she said something God would not approve of.  “We shouldn’t be discussing this right now, we have much more important things to do.”

“Right,” Kayla said struggling to remember what came next. 

Caroline glared at Steve, hoping he’d get the hint and go, but he just stood there, his shirt half opened.  Seeing as how he was unlikely to leave, she soldiered on.  “I wondered,” Caroline said, trying to keep her temper in check, “if you were going into work today.”

“Work?” Kayla asked.  She looked at Steve, who shrugged and gave her the same uncertain look right back.  “I, ah – I hadn't really decided?”  It was a question.  Did I get it right? Kayla asked herself.

“Well, Roman and Shawn and I have to make arrangements for the memorial service, and I was wondering if I could leave Max in the Emergency Center with you after he finishes school.

At the mention of his brother-in-law’s name, Steve smiled; the thought of seeing the cute little boy he helped save from the streets with his brother, Frankie, all those years ago was tempting.  Is it possible he might actually get to see that little dude?

Kayla hadn’t thought of the Emergency Center in quite some time.  She didn’t know what the answer was, but she had a vague recollection of what was happening and that she and Steve sniped because he took Max to the The Cheatin’ Heart, a bar his sister now owned.  “Yeah, ok.  That should be ok,” she told her mother, not at all sure if that was really ok or not.

“Well, thank you.  Alice is taking care of the twins, and Carrie isn't really feeling up to looking after Max, besides, he's close to you.”

“It's really no problem.  Is it, Steve?”

Steve wasn’t sure what she was getting herself into by promising to watch Max, but he knew as much as she did and was guessing just the same. Plus, he kind of wanted to see what was outside the loft, if it was just as in the past out there as the rest of them were.  “Yeah, sounds good, Sweetn—uh, Kayla.”

“It’s fine, Mom.”

“Well, thank you.” Caroline said, still feeling awkward and angry.  “I'd better go.  Roman and Shawn are waiting.” 

Caroline slid open the loft door and turned around one more time to say goodbye.

 “Mom?” Kayla reached out.

“Yes.”

“Come here,” Kayla said gathering her into an embrace.  She remembered this day now, and it was strong in her mind.  She really didn’t want her mother to leave angry.  “I’m sorry,” she said into her hair, “closing her eyes and feeling her mother’s arms around her.

Caroline pulled away and looked Kayla in the eye.  “See you later,” she said, then turned on her heel and left.  Kayla closed the door after her and shed a little tear.

“You alright?  Steve asked, putting a hand on her shoulder as she was turned away from him.

“Yeah, I just … I can’t believe that was actually my mom.  Did you see her, it was just like us. She was so much younger, I got emotional.”

“I know.”

“She said some awful things about you.”

“Yeah, she didn’t like me back then, did she?”

“I’m sorry.”

“That’s ok, I grew on her, didn’t I, Sweetness?”

Kayla chuckled.  “Yes, you did.”  She wanted to walk into his arms and kiss him right then, but there was a wall of uncertainty between them that made them both wary.  They didn’t know why, but they each silently questioned if they should really be touching each other.

“Ya know we forgot to ask what the date was.”

“It’s got to be the first or second week of December if it’s when Marlena died that first time.  When she disappeared, I mean, in 1986.”

“Well, I guess I’m expected at the Emergency Center.  Do … do I go?  I should probably shower.”

“Baby, that’s what got us into trouble with your mama the first time around, remember?”

She did remember, and despite herself, she bit her lower lip and smiled at the memory of Steve half naked in her apartment for the first time.  He saw the sexy look on her face and started to feel the need to touch her.

Then Kayla suddenly remembered something else.  “Oh my gosh!  Hold on a minute!”  Kayla ran into the guest room, leaving Steve to wonder what she was up to.”

“I think you need to get to work, baby?  Maybe?”  Then he added, “I dunno what the hell we’re supposed to be doin’, here,” just to himself as he rubbed at the back of his neck.

“Just hold on, you’re going to love this!” she called out to him. “I hope it’s here!”

Kayla sorted through the mess that Steve had left while searching for Joe and got a stab of worry realizing what the mess was from.  Finding her treasure under the overturned bedspread, Kayla grabbed it, very happy that it was where she remembered it. 

“What’s all this, baby?” Steve asked when she returned to him in the living room and held it out to him with a grin.

“Don’t you remember?  What does it look like?”  The long box was wrapped with flecked yellow paper and a thick green ribbon.  Steve smiled like a schoolboy, but for the moment, he didn’t remember what was in the package.  “Open it,” Kayla said, her knowing smile so big and full of happiness in the giving.  “I’d had this awhile before I gave it to you, and I remembered it was there just now and … I just had to give it to you again.” 

As soon as Steve undid the ribbon and opened the box, he knew what he was looking at, and the rush of emotions boiled up to the surface.  Steve looked at her with a damp eye that he wouldn’t hide from her this time around. 

“Sweetness,” his voice cracked.  “My beautiful pool cue.”

“And it wasn’t even Christmas,” she said with a kind of accomplishment, remembering his reaction the first time.

He stared down at it through tears.  “No one had ever given me a present ‘just because’ before.  No one had ever shown me their heart like that.”

Kayla watched him cry with joy and wanted so badly to hold him.  “Watching you unwrap it made me so happy.”

Steve opened the fasteners on the box, revealing the magnificent pool cue’s two pieces.  He took them out and enjoyed their solid weight while he connected them.  “You know, I’d already fallen in love with you by then, Sweetness.  You know that don’t you?”

“I loved you too.  You didn’t actually tell me for a long time, but I knew in my heart that you loved me.  Especially when you left that night.”

“When I left?”

Yeah, you … you wouldn’t stay the night.”

“Well, that was stupid of me.”

Kayla laughed while Steve grinned.  “Well, I sure thought so at the time,” she teased suggestively.  “But somewhere deep down,” her voice softened, “I understood that you loved me, but you were just afraid.  Other women were ok, but not me.  You were afraid.”

“There weren’t other women, Kayla,” he said with a serious tone.

“No, I know.  I mean, you said other women you could love and leave, but if you loved me, you might not be able to leave.  And then … then you looked at me.  You were out in the hallway, and I wanted to reach out and pull you back in.  And you looked at me with this … fear of falling over the edge.  I was disappointed that you wouldn’t stay the night with me, but I felt happiness underneath.  Like I was winning the war. There was so much meaning to your words.”

“I remember that.  It was a beautiful gesture, this gift.  And I had to get out of there before I was overcome.”  He wanted to touch her so much.

The love they felt for each other in that moment reliving the giving of the pool cue threatened to burst open their hearts.  Without another word, Steve covered the short distance to Kayla.  His pool cue in one hand, he grabbed her around the waist and covered her gorgeous lips with his in a relief and love-filled kiss.  The sparks he felt fly must have been real, because this kiss was like no other in recent memory.  “God, Kayla,” he choked out over his emotions.  She tasted like a sunburst.

The feel of Steve holding her so tightly with an intensity that electrified their kisses made her dizzy.  “Baby,” she said through lips she never wanted to stop kissing him with. 

Then Steve felt a strange sensation in his belly.  It was different than the usual feeling being physical with her gave him.  But he was too caught up in the joyous moment of kissing his 25-year-old wife with his 30-year-old lips to notice that something was a bit off in his body.  He allowed the sensation to pass without acknowledgement caught up in the feel of her, the smell of her hair, and the feeling in his heart. 

It was only the shrill cry of a baby that brought him out of his reverie.  Steve felt Kayla smile through their kisses, and she sighed with relief at the sound of the tiny wail.  He didn’t want to leave her embrace, but the sound of his baby calling to them was too strong to ignore. 

When he opened his eye, his heart sank. 

Kayla’s eyes were still closed as Steve’s kisses stilled, and the sound through the monitor filled her with such relief that she tore herself away with elation.  The sight that greeted her, however, was incongruous with where she just was.  Seconds ago they were standing upright in each other’s embrace; now they were lying in bed.  The sudden change in physical orientation caused a surge of dizzy nausea that made her bury her head in Steve’s chest with a sick moan.

Kayla’s eyes were closed to the wave she was hoping would pass as Steve stared down at her.  Her white nightgown was stark against the dark cherry headboard, and her hair was considerably longer with bigger, sleepier curls than she’d had just moments before.  “Kayla?” Steve whispered to her. 

The queasy moment passed, and now Kayla lifted her head to look at the still much younger face of her husband, only now he had the overgrown stubble that was the beginning of a beard.   Newfound confusion and bitter disappointment passed across Kayla’s face as Steve just tried to stay very calm.  “This isn’t our apartment,” Kayla said. “Or the loft.”

“No,” he replied, “but it is our bed.  The one from when he lived in our house.”   

Kayla knew he was right, but she just didn’t know what to do with this.  The baby’s cries continued, however, and that gave Kayla some comfort.  Itching to run to her son, she said, “at least we found Joe.”

But Steve knew better.  “Kayla.  Baby,” he said gently, still holding her in the arms he’d arrived to holding her in.  “I don’t think that’s Joe.”

“What?” she said with worry.

“Sweetness.  I think that’s Stephanie.”

Chapter Text

Find Me
Chapter 6

Steve and Kayla layed in bed facing each other with their same young faces.  The relief she had felt at hearing the baby cry lasted just moments before heartache set back in.  If Steve was right, and that was Stephanie in there, then where was their son?  Who was taking care of him?  Just as quickly, however, the cries made her realize that there was another baby that needed taking care of.

Kayla had strangely accepted that she was in the loft, but now that they were at the house, she was wary anew.  And damned curious.  She knew it wasn’t a dream, they were really at the loft in 1986.  Now that they seemed to have left the past as quickly as they’d arrived there, it left a string of unanswered questions queuing up in their heads.

Steve was in shock, but more to the point, the severely guarded look on Kayla’s face made him worried she would doubt he was real again.  Whatever was happening here, he believed she was with him, and he needed her to have that same belief in him or he was going to lose his mind.  “It’s me, baby,” Steve said tilting his head to square his eye upon her bewildered ones.  “You know it’s me, right?  And that’s you in there?”

“It’s me, Steve,” Kayla softly replied.  “The loft … We’re not there anymore.  This is the house.”

Relief flooded through him, and he leaned his head down to kiss her hand.  Well-past confusion and somewhat past awe, Steve had now moved into a remote sort of fascination.  He felt somewhat outside himself, like an observer watching this very weird movie that happened to be about him. 

But first, there was a baby crying.

“And that means,” he replied, “that that’s Stephanie in there, Sweetness.”

“Are you sure?  Maybe --”

“Kayla, there’s a baby crying for its mama in there, does it matter which one it is?”

“No, I guess it doesn’t,” Kayla said.  She pulled back the bedcovers and absently registered the nightgown she was wearing and the sheets that were on the bed.  Making mental notes of these little details, her brain got working in some measure on the date.

Steve said, “why don’t I go see who we’ve got,” knowing full well it was his daughter in there.

“No.  I remember the way.”

She left the room and headed down the hall to the baby’s room.  The pictures on the walls, the color of the paint, the sound of her feet shuffling across the floor – they were exactly as she remembered them.  With every second and every step, Kayla’s hope that she’d find Joe in there grew.  She knew the truth all the while but couldn’t bear to let that hope go.  Sure enough, when she arrived at the infant’s room and opened that door, it was Stephanie that stared out from her crib at her mother.  The beautiful eyes of her baby daughter sent a thrill of delight through Kayla, and she went to her baby without hesitation. 

“Stephanie,” she cooed.  “Baby girl.  Would you look at this beautiful baby girl in there!  Good morning.”  Her smile as she sing-songed her words to Stephanie made the baby girl squeal.  “Well, I think it’s morning.”  Kayla reached into the crib and scooped her up.  Stephanie was younger here than Joe was, maybe six months old, she guessed.  It has to be 1990, she thought.

Kayla nuzzled her little one, kissed her soft cheek, and wondered how her dark haired, brown-eyed beauty had ever been this small.  Momentarily content in her mother’s arms, Stephanie had begun to fuss with a wet diaper.  Instinctively, Kayla went right to the changing table and got her into a clean diaper like it was yesterday.  She picked up the baby and kissed her tummy.  It was just moments before she started crying again.

“I think you’re hungry, baby.”  Kayla felt to confirm what she instinctively knew.  “I’m sorry, Baby Girl, but the factory seems to have dried up.”  Where did we keep the formula? 

Not really sure what to do next, Kayla turned to head down to the kitchen when she saw Steve standing in the doorway.

“How long have you been there?”

“You think I was going to let you out of my sight on this insane trip of ours?  I followed you out the door.”

Kayla smiled.  “I’m glad you did.”

Steve walked into the room and took it in.  “I remember when I set this up for you.  I wanted to surprise you after that long ordeal.  I wanted to give you the most beautiful nursery.”

“And you did, too.  I was definitely surprised.  Your mom did such a nice job.”

“Hey, that was me that picked out all the decorations, now.”

“I know, I know,” she giggled.

Steve reached out to his daughter and put his hand on her head.  “Hey, Little Sweetness.  It’s me.  Your papa.  Remember me?” 

In answer, Stephanie grabbed his finger and dragged it into her mouth.  Looking at his baby for the first time in so long took his breath away.

Kayla saw this, and her heart broke just a little.  “She needs a feeding,” she said gently.  She then looked down to her chest and then back up at Steve.  “I don’t have any milk.”

“We did it differently with Little Sweetness.  Used that powdered stuff.”

“The formula.  We need to, ah – go to the kitchen.  Downstairs.”  Such a milestone going from one room to the next, to the unknown.  But it had to be done.  “Come with me?” Kayla asked softly.

“You have to ask?”

They headed down the hall and to the staircase of the house Kayla had been secretly pining to move back to since Steve’s memories returned a year and a half before.  Every step evoked new recognition and familiarity with the things they once owned, some they still did and some they did not.  Having arrived at the kitchen, it was like the end of a long essay, pretty confident in themselves that they got it right.

“You know where it is,” Kayla asked?

“Yeah, actually, I do.  Remember I did this for a few months while you were in prison.”

“I remember,” she said not really interested in reliving that particular memory.  “It was a long time ago.”

Yet on the first try, Steve opened a kitchen cabinet with three cans of baby formula, only one of which was opened.  “Yeah, well, for someone with memory problems, I seem to be 1 in 0 here.” He then opened a couple drawers and found what he was looking for.  “And look, I found the bottle, too.”

“That’s 2 in 0 then, huh?”  Kayla smiled at this handsome husband of hers while he continued to prepare Stephanie’s bottle.   “Swish?”

Steve looked up at her with love.  “Yeah, baby,” he said softly.  “Nothin’ but net.”

Stephanie had begun to fuss with the sounds she’d come to know as those that precede being fed and started kicking her legs.  Steve finished with the bottle and then held it out to Kayla.  She looked at it briefly then shook her head and held Stephanie out to her father.  “I think you should,” she said. 

Red flags went off for Steve immediately.  Did she wish this were Joe?  Was there some kind if pain she was working through here?

Steve’s concern was impossible to miss, and Kayla corrected it right away.  “No!  I’m fine!  You just look so content with the bottle in your hand, and you missed out on so much of her life, I just thought you might want to have this ... chance.”

And the truth was that he did.  He really did.  And he knew his wife well enough to know that she meant it.  Steve nodded with a small smile and took the warm, squirmy bundle his wife handed him.  With practiced ease, he settled the small baby into the crook of his arm and popped the nipple into her open mouth.  Kayla then walked with him into the livingroom and watched them settle onto the couch. 

Steve gazed into the very alert eyes of his baby.  A baby he had not seen in almost 19 years.  In real time it didn’t feel like 19 years to him, but he knew all the same that it was.  And now here he was with his baby Stephanie, getting to do this again.  What a gift, Steve thought.  Stephanie fixed him with a stare that would one day melt hearts (starting with his), and the warm feelings he had for her overcame his ability to keep his emotions in check.  Tears clouded his vision.  He became overwhelmed with loss.   

“Steve,” Kayla soothed as she went to him and put her knowing arms around him.  

“Oh Kayla,” he cried.  “I missed so much.  I missed it.  The whole damn thing.  Her whole childhood I wasn’t there.  I left my baby without a father, Sweetness.  What kind of man does that?  A man like my old man does that.  How could I do that to my daughter, baby?”

“Shhh.  You didn’t do that, that was done to you, Steve.   It was done to both of you.  To all of us.  You were stolen from her.  None of that was your fault.”

“I love her so much, Kayla.  How could I have let them beat it out of me?”

“You didn’t!  Baby, you didn’t!” she tried to console him.  “Remember what you said, the memories of us that you didn’t even know you had are what kept you going.  You had her in your heart.  And you came back to our lives.”

“Well not this part of your lives,” he hissed.  “They took me away and she grew up without me.  I want my baby girl back,” he yelled too loudly. “I want my family back, Kayla!  I want to watch my Little Sweetness walk and talk and ride a bike and wear clothes I don’t like.”  Kayla placed comforting kisses on his shoulder and laid her head down upon them. 

He felt Kayla’s comfort and tried to take strength from it.  Through his tears and anger, he watched his baby eat from the bottle his steady hand provided.  Then as if she knew her papa needed her, she shot up a tiny hand searching for something to hold on to. To Kayla’s utter happiness, the baby found her target in Steve’s pinky.  His big, tanned finger in the impossibly tiny pale ones belonging to his daughter lulled his anger.  The shame, however, didn’t ebb.

“I’m ashamed, Kayla.  I let you be programmed out of me.  I don’t know how you were able to forgive me.”

Kayla moved from the couch to kneel on the floor in front of him, Stephanie feeding between them.  “Listen to me,” she said with a desperate hand on his arm.  “Baby, listen to me right now.  You failed no one.  Not Stephanie, not me.  You are my hero, Steve Johnson.  You came back to us.  We win.”

He finally looked down at her through his crying green eye and kissed her temple. Kayla wiped his tears with her thumb and leaned over to kiss Stephanie’s head.  Steve took a deep breath, inhaling the scent of formula and Stephanie’s sweet baby breath, and leaned his head to the side to wipe the remaining tears off on his shoulder. 

Just then Stephanie let out a string of baby sounds, and Steve realized that she’d emptied the bottle.  “Boy, she ate that right up, didn’t she?”

“She sure did, didn’t you baby girl?”

He lifted the baby above his head and made baby noises back to her, then got up and walked over to the fireplace while patting a gentle hand on her back to burp her.  “Look at these old pictures, Sweetness.”

“I know.  They’re great, aren’t they?  We still have a lot of them up, you know.”

“Yeah, not all of them, though, look at this one from your parent’s anniversary party.

“Oh, yeah.  That dress.  Horrible.”

“Nah, you looked good to me.”  He looked over at Kayla then back up at the picture.  “And all that hair again.”

“Too much, I know,” she laughed.

“No,” he said.  “I liked it, baby.”

Kayla smiled at the memory of how lost they were in each other that night.

Steve continued to roam the living room looking at everything, taking it in, showing it all to Stephanie and explaining mundane things, including what a shelf is, that it’s nice to put nice photos in a frame, and that you should always pick up after yourself so your toys don’t get lost.  For her part, Kayla pretty much stayed where she was on the couch watching them, wondering if this would disappear in a flash like last time.  Finally, she spoke up.

“Ya know, Steve … we’ve been here, uh, a while.”  He knew what she was saying but didn’t reply, letting her finish her thought.  “We weren’t at the loft very long, but we’ve been here at least an hour.”

“I know, baby.  I think we should talk about what’s happening to us.”  Stephanie had fallen asleep in her father’s strong arms.  He kissed her head and looked around in wonder at the lack of baby things in their living room.  “Where’s the pack and play?”

“They didn’t make them then,” Kayla said.  “We had a bouncy seat.  Later I got a … playpen.”  She thought better of the “later” part, but Steve let it pass.

“I don’t wanna put her down.”

“Then don’t,” Kayla said.

Steve smiled down at her from the center of the living room, then went and sat beside her. 

“The loft really happened, didn’t it?  I mean, that felt real to me.”

“It felt real to me, too, baby.  It was real.”

“Then ... what’s this?  How did we suddenly get here?  When do you think we are, exactly?”

“Well, it has to be 1990, Stephanie was born in May.”

“Am I still in prison do you think?”

“How can you be, you’re right here.”

“How do we know that?  We woke up here, but we’re still us.  I mean, we’re the us from home.  From – I … I mean …”  Kayla struggled to put this whole thing into coherent words.”

“We still have these young faces, baby.  It’s like our bodies from 1990 are thinking like the ones from 2009.”  Steve lost what the point was.  “Wait, what was the question?”

“Am I in prison?”

“No, baby, you’re home.  We’re just at home.  Seems like not a care in the world.”

Kayla was staring at Stephanie sleeping in her father’s arms.  She was biting her bottom lip, and he could tell she wanted to have a turn. 

“Here, baby,” he said as he transferred Stephanie into Kayla’s arms.  “I think she needs some time with her mama.”

“Stephanie,” she whispered.  She enjoyed the familiar feel of her in her arms.

“When did she lose all that blonde hair?” Steve asked.

Kayla chuckled.  “It started to get darker when she was about four.  Then suddenly one day before I knew it, our daughter was a brunette.”

“Where’d she get that from?  I think it’s your brothers’ fault.  Let’s blame Roman.”

Kayla laughed, and Steve’s mood improved with the sound of it.

“So, what month do you think this is, summer, maybe?” 

Steve headed for the front door.  “I’ll go take a look.”

“No!”

Steve stopped short and looked at her with concern.  “What?”

“Don’t go!”

“I’m just going to open the front door, baby,”

Kayla got up to go with him.  “I don’t want us to be separated.”

Steve went to her.  “I know, I’m scared, too.”  He took her hand.  “Let’s go together.” 

Upon opening the front door, they felt a warm breeze blow through leaves of changing colors.  It felt like late summer.  More reliable, however, was the newspaper sitting on their front stoop.  “Perfect,” Steve said, bending down to get it as Kayla looked out the door cautiously.

“What’s the date?” Kayla asked, starting to bounce her now waking baby.

Steve unfolded the paper as Kayla craned her neck to see.  The date said September 18, 1990.

Steve closed the door and plowed his hand through his hair. 

“What do we do now?” Kayla asked.

“I don’t know, baby,” he said as he adjusted his patch and then pulled them toward him.  He held them tightly, kissing the top of his wife’s head.  But we should probably find it out soon.”

“Why?”

“Because I die in a month.”

Chapter Text

Find Me
Chapter 7

Had he said it with any kind of amusement, Kayla would have bristled.  But the statement was humorless, and Kayla could see the guilt heat back up that she’d tried to place at bay. 

“I’m not doing it again, Kayla.  I’m not leaving again!” He held her tighter, and Kayla felt his panic.  But her curiosity was stronger.  She’d done this before.  They both had.  And the ridiculous nature of where they now found themselves mixed with the bliss that she couldn’t help but feel sort of eclipsed the fear that his death was right around the corner.  Kind of.

“Let’s talk about this,” she said pulling away slightly. “Come here.  Come over and sit down.”  They went over to the blue and white-striped couch where Steve sat down heavily while Kayla wrapped her left leg under her.  Steve was getting more agitated with every moment as the realization of the time they didn’t have hit him. 

“Ok, I’m sittin’,” he said, his temper just under the surface.

“Here, I think someone wants her papa back,” she said.  Steve calmed immediately upon having his baby in his arms again.  A broad smile spread across his face as Stephanie made baby sounds, which Steve mimicked right back to her. 

“Papa doesn’t wanna leave his beautiful girls, does he Stephanie?” he baby babbled to her.  He gripped her under the arms and stood her up.  “Look at me, Mama, I’m almost walkin’.  Yes, I am.  Papa doesn’t wanna miss that all over again, now does he?  No he doesn’t.”  He gave her a string of kisses into her little baby neck.  “No he sure doesn’t, Mama, he doesn’t want to miss it again.”  More kisses, and she squirmed with delight.  

Kayla looked on with a mix of emotions as Steve lifted her high and nuzzled her feet, then bounced her up and down on his lap.  Watching them made her heart soar.  But she did the quick math in her head and knew that they had exactly five weeks to be a family before their worlds came apart. 

“I think we should talk about this,” Kayla said.  “I mean, we go to bed at home, then we wake up in the loft.  Then in the middle of a kiss, we end up in our house.  I think we need to figure out why this is happening.”  Steve gave her a curious look, almost like he was sizing her up.  “What?”

“You, baby.  The voice coming out of you.  You sound like my Kayla with the voice of old Kayla … young Kayla?  I mean—"

“I know what you mean,” she smiled.

“Past Kayla.  When I came back, you talked differently.  Stronger.”  Kayla understood that it was her pattern of speech that naturally changes as we mature through the years that he was referring to.  “It’s that way about you that is coming out of your mouth in your past voice right now, and it’s kind of throwing me.”

“I don’t seem like me anymore?” she asked worried.

“Nah, you’re you, baby, I know you’re you.  It’s just taking some getting used to.”

“It’s bizarre and doesn’t make any sense, but … I think we agree that we’re really here.  That this is real, right?”

“Well, this baby sure is real, isn’t she,” Steve baby talked.

“Yes, she is,” Kayla smiled, reaching over to squeeze her foot.

Steve looked over at his wife and smiled.  “You always did know how to bring me back to earth, baby.  He cupped her face and looked at her with love and still a bit of wonder. 

Steve inhaled deeply and adjusted his patch.  “It’s like we’re stuck in movie.  Groundhog Day or something.  Ya know, like maybe we have to get something right or it’s gonna start over again.”

Kayla thought about that for a second.  “But … we didn’t start over again, we leaped from 1986 to now, four years later.”

“We leaped?!  Who are you, baby, Dr. Samuel Beckett?  What does that make me, Al?”

Kayla didn’t have the foggiest idea what Steve was talking about, but she laughed, anyway.  “What’s that a sci-fi movie?”

“TV show.  Quantum Leap.  This dude kept leaping from one person to another and had to live in their body until he put right what once went wrong.  Great show.”

“Ok, sure,” she indulged him with a bit of a laugh, “so we fixed something back at the loft then jumped here?  But I don’t think anything really went wrong there.  Did it?  I don’t remember, it was 20 years ago.”

“For you, it was, baby, it was for you.  But for me, this place right now?  Yeah, it’s 20 years ago, but in a way it’s not actually that long ago for me.  The day I … died – that they took me from you – to the day I got my memory back, that was like from one day to the next for me.  So, a part of me remembers the loft like it was five years ago, not 20.”

The reality of Steve’s absence stabbed at Kayla every now and then; this was one of those times, and she got a little sad.  “Ok, so did we fix something?”  The whole discussion was nuts, but she was grasping at straws and trying to seriously figure out what was going on.

Steve thought hard.  But he couldn’t really think of anything that was fixed.  “No, baby,” he said dragging his hand down his face,” I don’t think so.

Then she had a thought.  “But the pool cue was different.  I gave that to you a few days later the first time.”

“So, what, you were supposed to do that earlier then?  How could that have made a difference?  I was standing in a towel in your apartment with your mom about to have a coronary, how would giving me the pool cue have fixed anything?“

Kayla thought about it, but the whole concept of having to fix something wasn’t really gelling for her.  “Maybe we just—" 

“Five weeks!” Steve cut her off with a sudden realization.  “Sweetness … in five weeks I die.  They take me away.  We can fix that!  He handed Stephanie back to Kayla and shot up to his feet, suddenly revved up with possibility.  “Oh Baby,” he turned on his heel.  “We know how it happens, right?  All I have to do is not go to that dock that day. And make sure Bo doesn’t go either!”

The possibility of avoiding the whole ordeal that was Steve’s disappearance cast a whole new spin on where they were. And it quickly became irresistible.

“You … don’t go to the dock,” she said softly with dawning understanding, “and we … put it right.” 

“We can forget the whole thing ever happened, baby.  And start over!”  Kayla was excited by the possibility.  Too excited.  In fact, she was suddenly feeling completely desperate.   A shadow crossed her features.  “Sweetness?  What’s wrong?”

Kayla got up and bounced Stephanie.  “Forget it?” she laughed without humor.  “I wish I could. I won’t lie, I’ve tried to forget that horrible night every single day since you were taken away.  It’s like a wound that won’t ever completely heal.  We have you back, but the pain never went away.  It was the worst day of my entire life, Steve.  The day I lost you.  I can’t lose you again.”

“Baby, you’re not gonna lose me, now.  You won’t have to go through that again.  None of us do.  I can be there for Stephanie’s first steps.  First word.  All her firsts.”  He grabbed Kayla into a fierce embrace.  “And we can have the life we were supposed to have!”

Now Kayla was crying, and the baby started to fuss.  “I don’t know, I … it doesn’t really seem to all fit.  Why did we go to the loft first?  What got put right there?  Why not just jump right here?  Or leap?  Or whatever.  Maybe … maybe we’re on the wrong track.”

“What other track is there?  What else makes sense?”

“None of this makes sense!” she yelled, angered for the first time since this whole thing began.  “None of it makes any kind of logical sense!   How is any of this even possible?!  We don’t know what’s happening with us, Steve!  We don’t know where Joe is, we don’t even know for sure that there’s life outside this house, and we don’t know how long this is going to last!”

“Well, I don’t have an explanation!” Steve roared, getting mad right along with her.  “And I don’t wanna die, Kayla!  I want my life back!  I want my 16 years back, baby!  They were stolen from me,” Steve pounded his chest, “and I want ‘em back!”

Stephanie started to cry, and Steve felt immediate remorse for having scared his daughter.  His anger receding with the cries of his baby, Steve went to her and placed tender kisses on her head.  “I’m so sorry, Little Sweetness.  Papa’s sorry.  Papa just loves you so much, that’s all.  It’s just that I don’t want to leave you.”  He brought his eyes up to Kayla and saw her tears burning hot down her cheeks.  “I love your mama, too.  I’m sorry, baby.  I’m just trying to make something fit, here.  Make … it up to you.”

Kayla wiped her tears with the heel of her hand.  “I know,” she said.  I know you just want to fix it.  To put it right.”  Steve looked at her through a green eye that looked the same to her no matter when they were and nodded through the lump in his throat.  “You know what else, Steve? 

“What? He choked.”

“I think we shouldn’t think about it right now.  I think we should just enjoy this day.  See what it brings.”  Steve took a deep breath and nodded, calming down as best he could.  “I don’t know about you, but I’m hungry, and I think we should just enjoy each other and worry about all of this “when” stuff later.

“Ok,” he said, kissing Stephanie on the head.  “Ok, baby.  We’ll just enjoy this day.”

The baby was still crying, and Kayla tried to soothe her with a soft shuh-shuh-shuh-shuh-shuh. 

An awkward silence then fell upon them.  Steve’s brain was in such a knot trying to figure it all out that it wasn’t until she’d suggested food that he listened to the signals this body was giving him.  “Are you hungry?” Kayla asked.

“Not only am I hungry, Sweetness, I have to pee.”

Kayla laughed, and the awkward was broken.  “Well that makes two of us.”

They got up and Kayla said, “I think we should go get dressed, maybe?”

“He looked at her and just kind of gave up.  “Ok,” he smiled.

They headed up the stairs, put Stephanie in her crib, and Steve looked back at her.  The call of nature was pulling him, but he was leery to leave her room.  “What if she’s not there when we come back?”

“Maybe … maybe I should stay here while you go get ready.”

The fear that one of them would turn around and the other would be gone was apparent, even if not spoken.  “No, I don’t think we should be apart.”

“What about Stephanie?”

“Didn’t you say we have a bouncy seat?” 

They found it in the closet and brought everything into their bedroom.  Kayla placed the baby in it, and she watched as Stephanie contentedly bounced for the time being.

“You go first,” Kayla said.  Steve kissed his wife on the top of her head, this new surrounding making them, once again, shy to kiss each other yet. 

When Steve entered the bathroom, he about flipped out at the guy staring back at him from the mirror.  He hadn’t looked at himself since this thing began, and like Kayla had experienced in the loft, the young face he saw in the mirror was shocking.  But also kind of comforting.  This was how he saw himself.  For two years, ever since he’d gotten his memory back, Steve had been looking at himself wondering how he’d aged so quickly.  For him, he was just in his 30’s a minute ago.  The 50-something face he’d been wearing since then was the one that was kind of foreign to him and that, truth be told, he still wasn’t quite used to.  So, this face?  This was him.  He was back.  He ran his hand through his long hair, and thought, mullet my ass.  This thing looked good on me. 

Kayla watched him through the open bathroom door and knew exactly what was going on.  “Bit of a shock isn’t it?” she called in through the door.

“Huh?”

“Seeing yourself for the first time.  I went through the same thing at the loft.”

Steve was feeling suddenly alive.  The worry about his impending death and how they got there and what was happening was replaced with the sense that he was home. That this was right. That he was right.  That he wanted to go live this day.  Kayla was right, the best thing to do, he thought, was enjoy their family and live today.

Steve didn’t realize how badly he’d had to pee until he finally relieved himself.  If that’s not real, I don’t know what is, he thought.  Yep, this body is definitely real.  He started the shower, and yelled, “Baby, the toothbrushes are just where they’re supposed to be!”  Even the toothpaste tube had been squeezed down to half.  And he couldn’t help but wonder what their bodies were doing before they got there.  Was it business as usual for them until they got there in bed that morning, or were they actually 1990 Steve and Kayla whose future awareness suddenly “turned on?”  His mind began swimming again, and he didn’t want to go there, he just wanted to be with his wife and daughter. So, he pushed it aside, got in the shower, and let the hot water wash over him, cleansing the confusion out of him for the moment.

Kayla sat on the floor facing Stephanie in the bouncy seat and kept an equal eye between her and the bathroom, making sure Steve was still there.  It wasn’t so irrational, as she really didn’t know how long this was going to last.  Already they’d been here in the house more than twice as long as they’d been at the loft, so she wasn’t sure what to expect. 

Steve emerged in a towel, his tanned body still slick from the shower.  Kayla licked her lips and absently let them part a bit.  It didn’t matter what decade they were in, that act always sparked Steve’s arousal. 

“Are you, ah, ready?”

He leered at her and smirked, then looked down at his towel.  “What do you think, Sweetness?”

She got up from the floor and walked over to him.  “That’s not what I meant,” she smiled playfully, placing her palms tenderly on his chest.  But his tattoo called to her, and she couldn’t resist covering its handle with her soft lips. 

“Oh baby,” he sighed as he grabbed the back of her head and wondered what making love in these young bodies would be like.

Then Kayla heard the baby squeal and looked up at her husband.  “We’re not alone, here ya know,” she grinned at him.”

“Yeah, just like home, huh?” he smiled back.  But the reference to Joey caused a stab through Kayla’s heart that sank her mood.  Steve saw immediately that he’d said the wrong thing and felt his son’s absence just the same.  “I’m sorry, Sweetness,” and embraced her with apology.  “I didn’t mean to say that.”

“No, it’s ok.”  She wrapped her arms around him and laid her head on his chest.  She wondered again who was taking care of her baby, but then she looked back at her other baby and remembered her purpose.  “I … I think maybe we should just … ya know … do what we’d normally do.  Did.  Eat something.  Be together I can go to the bathroom for starters.”  Steve chuckled.  “Maybe we can go in the yard … see what’s out there.”

“Ok, Sweetness,” he said and brushed a kiss onto her temple. 

Kayla looked up to him, and the wall of uncertainty that came down at the loft came down here, too.  As they locked eyes she threaded her hands through his hair and pulled him down to her lips.  Their kiss was warm and tender, and they took sweet pleasure in the feel of themselves in each others’ arms.

She pulled away and smiled up at him.  “I love you.”

“I love you, too, baby.  So much.”

With another kiss to his tattoo, Kayla said, “I think I’m going to go in and have a turn now.  You think you have things handled in here?”

“Yeah,” he blew out his breath, “I think I can find a shirt and jeans somewhere.”

“Ok,” she smiled and headed into the bathroom.  “I’ll be right back, Baby Girl,” she cooed to Stephanie.”

“Sweetness!” Steve called.

“Yeah,” Kayla poked her head back out.

Steve’s look was serious.  “Leave the door open.”

Kayla nodded knowingly.  “Don’t leave the room, ok?”

“I’m not taking my eye off either of my girls.  And when you’re done in there, I’m gonna whip us up a big breakfast.”

“Sounds great,” she said.  She gave him a smile and headed in for her own shower.

Chapter Text

Find Me
Chapter 8

While Kayla showered, Steve replaced her spot on the floor across from Stephanie.  He’d found a pair of jeans and what used to be his favorite black button-down shirt.  The freshly clean fabric felt so good going on, he let out sigh of pleasure. 

The anger of his stolen 16 years had ebbed and flowed over the three years since his return, but since Joe had been born, he’d been able to get past it most of the time.  It’s hard to be furious and angsty when you’ve got the family you always wanted staring you in the face every day.  And he was thankful to have that back after not only all those years but the difficult ones after.  The woman he loved still loved him, the daughter he left behind he got back, and the baby boy they didn’t know fate had planned was delivered to them, too.  But that bitterness of what he’d lost was never quite soothed.  It vacillated between anger at the ones who took him and anger at himself for not being strong enough to stop them, but it was always there somewhere deep within him. 

Now, he sat across from his baby girl and bounced her seat gently up and down.  She smiled and cooed and flailed her arms in glee.  She looked at him like he was the only thing in her entire world, and he felt how much he loved her.  What he was feeling was not a remembered love for his baby 19 years ago, and it was not what he was feeling for his now grown daughter.  It was pure love for this baby that was currently Stephanie at the age of four months old, bouncing before him, with nothing in her eyes but that same, innate, unconditional love.  And it was tangible.  He could feel it start to relieve the pain of his absence.  And he started to feel less like a man who failed his family and more like simply … her papa.

Steve was an emotional person.  He always had been, despite his best efforts.  And he felt every drop of that overwhelming love for Stephanie in that moment.  Rather than cry, he was awed by this opportunity.  By the chance to spend time with his family, love them, and be loved by them.  Today.  September 18, 1990.  And he was going to take it.

“Hey Little Sweetness.  You want me to tell you a bedtime story?  I know you like stories.  Ya know how I know that?  ‘Cause on the day you were born, you were just a few hours old, I told you your very first story.  I held you right in this arm here,” he told her as he held out his right arm to her.  “You were all snug and warm, and I told you … about a baby girl named Stephanie.  And how her daddy went and got his armor and slayed all the dragons in the land so that she … and her mama … and him … could live happily ever after.”

Stephanie laid in the bouncy seat at rapt attention as Steve continued to bounce it with his fingers when the undulating movement would wane.

“Well, I’m gonna tell you another story, Little Sweetness.  One day not nearly long enough after that baby named Stephanie was born, a very bad dragon came to make trouble for them.  Turns out her daddy slayed all the dragons in the land, except for this one who was hiding in Italy.  And that dragon went and stole the daddy from his family.  That wasn’t supposed to happen, now, but you know, this little baby was actually a very lucky girl, you know why, Sweetheart?  ‘Cause she had the best mama in all the land.  In all of time.  And this fair lady, she put on her own armor that the daddy didn’t even know she had, and she fought to get the baby Stephanie’s daddy back for her.  And the mama, she won that fight, slayed that dragon, and got their family back.  That’s what she did.  And then they really did live happily ever after.”

Kayla had come out of the bathroom with a robe and wet hair and tears streaming down her newly washed face.  She came and sat beside Steve and laced her arm around his. 

“You did, Sweetness,” he said to her while still looking at his daughter.  “You’re the one who slayed that last dragon to bring me back from the dark.”

Kayla leaned over and kissed Steve on the cheek and reached over to tickle Stephanie’s tummy.  The baby squealed and Steve and Kayla delighted in her. 

Steve looked over at his wife with a light in his eye.  “You were right, baby.  Today we need to live.  We need to go just be together in this house and be the mama and the papa and the baby Stephanie, together, living happily ever after.  We can deal with October 23^rd another day.  Not today.”

“That’s a good idea,” she smiled.  “What do you think, Stephanie?”

“Hmm.  Right now, I think she’s thinking about sheep,” Steve said looking over to his now napping baby.

“As they stood up, Kayla’s robe opened slightly, revealing the curve of her breast.  Steve looked away as if this was the stolen glance of someone other than a man married to his wife.  He didn’t know why, but he felt it was a step he shouldn’t take yet.  Kayla looked up at him, and the look of Steve with that hair in that shirt made her incapable of looking away from his beautiful face. 

“I always did like you with your hair wet,” Steve said, reaching out to touch it.  It wasn’t the first time he’d said that to her.  There was something about her wet hair that just endeared her to him. 

“I know,” Kayla said.  “You always liked my hair.”

The sexual tension was starting to build, and she couldn’t stop herself from blurting, “And boobs.”

Steve raised an eyebrow to her and feigned innocence, to which she gave him a “caught ya” look.

Trading grins, Kayla went to her drawers to find something to wear and realized that all the clothes she now had she wasn’t really that fond of anymore.  “Steve, did I own anything without shoulder pads?  Maybe a nice t-shirt?  Or yoga pants?”

“In 1990, Sweetness?  Wasn’t yoga still weird then?”

“No!  Plenty of people did it then.  Didn’t they?”

“I wouldn’t know, but I’ll tell you this, you didn’t own yoga pants or whatever those things are.”

“There must be a pair of leggings in here, then, I mean, it’s 1990!”

Finally giving up, Kayla settled for a set of plain white underwear, a bra in a size that made her snort, and a green jumper with a blousy white patterned shirt.  It seemed like the most comfortable thing she owned.  What was I thinking?

Steve tried not to watch her dress, and Kayla tried not to feel weird with him failing to succeed.   She let her hair air dry, and the long waves fell in a pretty waterfall around her face.  By the time she was done, Steve had stopped trying to avert his eyes and was all out staring at her. 

“I think it’s time you and I did something, Sweetness.”

“You do?” she asked shyly.

“Eat.”

Kayla smiled.  “Yep,” she answered, “I believe it is.”

Kayla lifted her napping daughter out of her bouncy seat.  “I thought you never wake a sleeping baby,” Steve said.

“In this case, I think whatever rules there are are completely moot.  Besides,” she whispered, “I don’t think this woke her.”

Steve looked over at the clock on his nightstand and saw that they were still in the morning hours.  “Well, I don’t know about you, baby, but I’m thinking an omelet and toast with lots of butter is the way to begin our day here, don’t you?”

“Definitely,” she said, her mouth genuinely watering.  “What if we don’t have eggs?”

“You doubt me, Sweetness?  Are we not always stocked with eggs?”

Kayla laughed and agreed that Steve did a good job keeping the staple foods around.  The three of them headed downstairs for the second time that day.  Steve breezed from one end of the kitchen to the other with relative ease, remembering where most things were, and cooked them omelets and toast, plus a full package of bacon.  “What?  I’m hungry,” Steve said when Kayla gaped at him placing the last of the entire package in the skillet.

“There’s only two of us standing here, do you plan on inviting the neighbors?”

“Baby, you can’t have too much bacon.”

The three of them ate like there was no tomorrow because maybe there won’t be, and when they were done, Steve prepared another bottle of formula for Stephanie.  Which she sucked down so quick it made his head spin.

“Was she always this hungry?” Steve asked.

“Yep.”

And that’s how the day for this little family went.  No one had ever been happier to do so many ordinary things in the confines of their own home on a beautiful day.  The first thing they did was tour the house they hadn’t seen in so long, taking in every nook and cranny their eyes could take in.  From the basement to the attic to the empty bedroom that held boxes of stuff long forgotten, no corner was uninteresting to them.  No piece of furniture went without a sweep of their fingers.  And no window was passed without the unasked question, what’s out there, entering their minds.

“Do you think we should, ya know, call the neighbors?  Or our families?  I saw my mother yesterday – or earlier or whatever that was – but maybe you want to call your mom, now?  Or Adrienne?”

It had entered Steve’s mind, but it didn’t sit well with him.  He just had a bad feeling about it.  It didn’t take him long to figure out exactly where his mother was and what Adrienne and Justin were up to.  He thought he might even remember Jo’s phone number – some things just stick with you.  And he did want to reach out and hear the voices of his mother and his sister.  But for a reason he couldn’t quite put his finger on yet, he was leery to make outside contact.  Were there rules here?  He was worried about what would happen if he made the wrong move. Which was also why the three of them never left each others’ sight.

“I’m not sure, baby, I just think we should be careful until we know for sure what’s going on.”

“What if we never find out what’s going on?  We can’t avoid people forever.  I mean, how else are we going to prevent you from dying?”

He put his arm around her and said, “I know you’re right, baby.”  Kayla knew her husband in any time, however, and she could tell that he’d made up his mind.  “But I think for today it’ll keep.”  She wasn’t so sure, but Kayla wasn’t about to argue with him and accepted his decision.  The truth was she was relieved that he didn’t want to attempt to contact anyone.  Part of her certainly wanted to see them all in this time, but most of her was still, frankly, freaked out.  Staying with her Steve in this time and getting to be together as a family just the three of them was precious, and she wanted it to themselves today.

One hour turned into the next, which turned into two more before they found themselves back to the kitchen for lunch.  Kayla handled this meal, sticking four pieces of bread into the toaster and made them BLTs with the leftover bacon.  Actually, they were more like BL’s; she didn’t find any tomatoes.  “That’s ok, Sweetness, everything goes with bacon.”

Shortly thereafter, Stephanie began to fuss quite a bit.  Whatever was happening to them, this little Stephanie was, without a doubt, every bit the 4-month-old baby she was supposed to be, and she needed her nap.  They still did not want to be separated, however, so they spent the next three hours in Stephanie’s room.  They started out sitting next to each other on the floor of her room with their backs against the wall, holding hands, and whispering memories shared in this home all those years ago.  Later, they read the newspaper and got a much better sense of what was going on in Salem and the world these days.  Then they held hands and did the crossword puzzle together.  “Hey, we did this one before, baby, remember 9-across?” Steve joked in a whisper, “I knew that one then, too!”  

Kayla jabbed him in the ribs with her elbow and whispered, “knock it off” with a wry smile.

Looking at the date on every page of the newspaper, Kayla couldn’t help but be reminded of the impending one coming on October 23^rd.  She did everything she could to push it away and just live in the moment of the crossword puzzle. 

When the baby woke, Steve changed her diaper for the third time and kissed her baby feet. 

“You’ve always been a pro in the diaper department,” Kayla said.

“Yes, I am,” he baby talked to Stephanie.  Good thing, too, ‘cause you about had an explosion down there!”  Kayla laughed, and Steve saw the light in her eyes.  She was enjoying this day as much as he was.  “Come on, Mama!  It’s time for an airplane ride!”  Then he scooped the baby up and airplaned her out of the room with whirring noises, down the hall to their room, back out, down the stairs, and back into the livingroom.  Kayla laughed right along with Steve, and Stephanie just cackled.  The three of them played like that together for a solid hour before Steve finally fell in a heap onto the couch. 

“Whoooo!  Oh, man!  You’d think I didn’t have a baby back home!  I should have more energy at this age, right?”  He was breathing harder than he thought he should have, and this time he didn’t catch his reference to Joe.  Then again, Kayla didn’t take it as hard this time, either.  Being with Stephanie this way didn’t make her worry any less about where he was and who was with him while they were off … wherever this was … but it did keep her too busy to dwell on something she had no way of fixing at the moment.

Kayla placed Stephanie on her belly for some tummy time, then she laid on her own opposite her and rested her chin upon her layered hands.  “Look at my little Beauty!” she cooed to her baby.  “There ya go!  Up!  Lift up, up, up, Baby Girl!”

All day, Steve had reveled in his daughter.  Every waking moment he had was with her.  He held her, watched Kayla hold her, played with her, changed her diapers, listened to her cry for a reason they couldn’t figure out, watched her stop for equally mysterious baby reasons, and just enjoyed being with her.  Now, as he looked on at the two of them laying on the floor having tummy time, Steve was moved.  Moved by this gift.  This chance to live a day in his life over again.  It was absolute joyousness, and he just wanted to stop the clock, get off here, and restart it again.

Kayla looked up at him.  “What are you thinking about?” she asked.

“You, baby,” he said solemnly.  “Her.  Us.  I’m thinking about how much I love you both.  How much I love our family.  How there’s nothing on this earth I want more right now than to keep us here forever.”

Stephanie had reached her limit on her belly, and Kayla scooped her back up and nuzzled her neck.  “I want that, too,” she said looking up at him from the floor.  “I want that so much, Steve.”  They chose not to state the obvious out loud.  Would all this be here an hour from now, let alone in the morning.

In the next hour the sun had begun to hang low on the horizon, and they opened the door to enjoy the breeze.  Steve became introspective for a moment. He bowed his head and said, “I don’t know how this day could have been any better, Sweetness.”  Then he leaned over to her and kissed his wife’s lips tenderly and with promise.

“I do,” Kayla said pulling away laying the side of her head on his chest.  “Let’s go outside just a few steps onto the porch and see our baby in the daylight before the sun sets.”

Standing at the threshold of the doorway, Steve couldn’t deny that he was itching to feel the sun on his face.  “Ok,” he nodded.

As a unit, with Stephanie held out in front of Kayla facing the world, the three of them stepped from the safety of the house to the outdoors of the front stoop.  And then …

… nothing happened.  Kayla let out the breath she’d been holding, and Steve nervously plowed a hand through his hair and adjusted his patch.  But other than the birds chirping and the faint sound of a lawn being mowed somewhere, not much else was going on in the vicinity of the one step they took out their front door.  Even so, Steve felt immediately cautious and darted his eye hither and yon looking for some sign of surveillance. 

Kayla took another step to lean over the small railing and looked back at Steve.  “Boo!” she said playfully.

“Oh, you’re a comedian now?” he said and quickly followed her.

Kayla closed her eyes and inhaled deeply of the fresh air as Stephanie kicked her legs.  Eventually they got bold enough to go sit on the porch swing.  “Mmm,” Kayla sighed with her head on Steve’s shoulder.  “This is wonderful.”  Steve held his wife tightly with her hair tickling the skin of his neck and felt a warmth and contentment in the golden September sunset that quelled his demons.  Most of them, anyway.

Eventually, the wind chilled, and they returned indoors.  Before they knew it, dinner was upon them, and Steve jibed, “well, we’re still here, Sweetness, so how about dinner?”

“We really are, aren’t we,” she said with a look of awe on her face.  “Well, we don’t have tomatoes, so what else did you have in mind?”

Steve was eager to cook a nice meal, and he went to the fridge and took out all the ingredients he’d need for beef stroganoff.  Kayla prepared some rice cereal she found in the cabinet with the formula for Stephanie, and by 6pm they were all eating a fantastic dinner. 

“Rice cereal?” Kayla offered, pointing the baby spoon at him.

“Gee, hate to pass it up, but, no.”

“Don’t know what you’re missing.”

“Yeah, well this ain’t my first time at the rodeo, baby, I think I do.”

Kayla giggled, and Stephanie banged her tray for the spoonful her papa graciously declined.

Afterward, she could see Steve tiring before her eyes, so Kayla told her husband to sit and let her clean up.  He didn’t fight her on it.  He sat down in the kitchen chair, caught her arm and said, “Come here.”  He pulled her down to him so that she straddled his lap facing him.  Kayla smiled and wrapped her arms around his neck.  “This has been an amazing day, baby.  Being here with my amazing wife and our amazing daughter in this amazing house.”  He reached up and played with her fingers in his own, then pulled her head down to his.  “I love you, Kayla,” he whispered meaningfully.

“I love you, too,” she whispered back through plump, smiling lips.

She then covered his lips with hers and kissed him lovingly.  For the first time since they’d arrived here, Steve couldn’t resist but sink his tongue into her mouth searching for the warm wetness of her own.  When he found it, Kayla started to electrify.  It didn’t take long for her to feel Steve harden beneath her, sparking her own strong arousal.  Brought back to earth by Stephanie’s flailing arms knocking her rice cereal onto the floor, it was all Kayla could do to tear herself away, standing up swiftly.

“Oh, come on, baby, you were just kissin’ me, you’re gonna kill me, here.”

Kayla licked her lips, snickered, and grabbed a dishtowel.  “I think, ah – I think we should –”

“I think we should, too, baby.”

“Steve,” she shot him a look, “I think,” she said purposefully, “that we should get this little one down for the night pretty soon.”  The look on her face, however, said she was thinking something else.

Steve’s groin was aching, and his heart was swelling, and when his head cleared slightly, he realized he wasn’t sure what they should or shouldn’t be doing right now.  He knew what he wanted to be doing, but that should part nagged at him.  So, he relented and played with his baby while Kayla cleaned up the dishes.  When Kayla bent down to clean the one up off the floor, he stole another look at her pert breasts through the collar of her shirt and felt a bit giddy.

The two of them went back upstairs and gave their daughter a bath together continuing to take pleasure out of their family time.  Then everything came to a grinding halt.  As Kayla changed the baby into a warm onesie for the night, they both realized there was nowhere to put her down where they could all be in the same room.  Again, they went through the What if she disappears? conversation, worry etching Kayla’s pretty face.  “I don’t think we thought this far ahead,” Kayla said.

“Well, to be honest, I never thought we’d get this far.”

Kayla grinned and looked down.  “I remember you saying that once before.”

“Yeah,” Steve smiled back at her and cupped her face in his hand, remembering right after they made love the first time on the roof of the loft.  “Glad I was wrong.  Both times.”

Kayla leaned her face into his palm, then turned and kissed it. 

“Baby,” Steve blew out his breath, “how many real hours have we been away from home now, 12 or 13?  I don’t know if it’s right or wrong, but being here? It feels right.  Being with my girls, my family,” he said, bringing Kayla into an embrace as they looked down into the crib at Stephanie, “this is just home, baby.  It’s home.”

“It is,” Kayla said softly. 

“I don’t want to let you out of my sight, and if we didn’t have the monitor, I’d insist we sleep here on the floor.”

“Maybe we should …”

“Remember what you said to me this morning, Sweetness?  Let’s just do what we did then.”

Kayla looked up to him unsure, but the alternative was sleeping on her floor or having her sleep in the bouncy seat, which wasn’t an option.  “Ok,” she reluctantly agreed.  “Good night, Baby Girl,” Kayla cooed down at her.  I love you, Stephanie.”

Steve leaned over and rested his chin on the crib side.  “You remember that story I told you, now, Little Sweetness.  Happily ever after.  I promise,” hoping to God he didn’t have to break that promise to her again in a month’s time.  He lowered the crib side, kissed her head, and inhaled her baby scent one last time for the night. “I love you,” he whispered.  Then he raised the crib side, and they headed back for their bedroom.  

Chapter Text

Find Me
Chapter 9

Kayla got five steps down the hall and stopped.  Steve saw the look in her eye and knew she was feeling just as unsure about letting Stephanie sleep alone as he was.  Kayla turned on her heel and ran back through the door to make sure their daughter was still there. Which she was.

“Kayla,” Steve sighed heavily, “this is gonna give us ulcers, we’ve got to just keep goin’ here.”

She returned to the hallway and swayed nervously while biting her lower lip. “Maybe one of us should stay here while the other gets some sleep.”

“No!  We’re not going to risk being apart.”

“Then why is it ok to leave Stephanie?”

Then a thought occurred to him, and he suddenly felt very confident.  “Because she was here when we got here.”  He paused to mull this over even as he said it.  “So,” he looked to her door then back at Kayla, “I don’t think she’s going anywhere.”  Steve didn’t know where he’d come up with that, but as soon as he said it, it felt right. 

“She was here when we got here, wasn’t she?  She’s the first thing about here that we noticed.  She’s part of this time.”  Kayla’s face was suddenly somber with dawning realization.  “Steve.  She belongs here.”

Steve felt a light go on.  “That’s right, baby.”  He reached out his right hand and touched her hair.  “We’re the ones who don’t belong.  Do we?”

“Our … our bodies do,” she said, trying to sound positive.  “These are the right bodies. But who we are, our psyches maybe … I think maybe they … don’t.”  Then they looked at each other with the same question in their eyes like a burden.  Why?

They went back to their own room as Steve went over this in his head.  Once inside, he turned on the baby monitor, and the comforting sounds of their daughter sounded through the room for a few short minutes before Stephanie had fallen asleep. 

Steve walked over to his wife and held her face in his hands.  “You know what, Sweetness?”

“What?” she asked, her heartbeat quickening as much with his touch as with the look in his eye.”

“I think this day was a gift.  I got to love my baby daughter again, Kayla.” He reached over and gently brushed her hair back off her face.  “It was one of the best days in my whole life,” then he kissed her forehead with a lingering kiss.  “Ya know,” he added with a toss of his head, “other than the whole Twilight Zone thing.”

“Twilight Zone, huh?” she repeated with a smile.

“Mm-hmm,” he nodded with a smirk.

“So, let me just make sure I’ve got this right,” Kayla said as Steve brushed more of her hair back with his palm and ran his thumbs over her cheeks.  “We’ve gone from Groundhog Day to Quantum …”

“Leap.”

“Leap, and now we’re in the Twilight Zone?”

“Yeah, that sounds about right, don’t you think?  Just flippin’ channels, lookin’ for something good to watch.”

“Oh really, now?”

“Yeah, baby, I think so.”

“Well, I think you’d better give me the clicker, then.”

“Hell, no, baby, don’t you know men need to be in control of those things?”

“Oh,” Kayla tilted her head down and raised her arm in surrender.  “Far be it from me to deprive you of your manly needs, Mr. Johnson.”  She didn’t intend for the statement to have a double meaning, but Steve’s eye turned from playful to hungry in an instant.  In response her body thrummed to life with an intense longing that brought her back to a different time.  She’d been looking him all day, so it shouldn’t have come out of nowhere.  But suddenly, she saw the impossible face she’d dreamed about for 16 years standing before her, touching her, and looking at her with lust glinting in his eye.  It’s not that she didn’t love her Steve, the one that should have been back with her in 2009, it’s just that she couldn’t help but remember how badly she’d ached for this one.  Not a day went by that this face wasn’t in her thoughts.  Not a week went by that she didn’t dream of how it felt to have his body surrounding her in protection and love and desire and commitment.  Not a moment went by in all of those 16 years that she didn’t harbor the wish that she could see that face just one more time.  The intensity of her need for him -- this him, the one with this face – overwhelmed her.  She needed to touch him.  Feel her lips on his, see the green of his eye and the height of his stance and the tone of his skin.  She needed to feel herself engulfed by this man that she longed for every moment of every day for 16 years.

“What is it, Sweetness?” Steve asked after seeing something in her very distinctly change.

Her voice was shaking.  “I’m seeing you, and I know you’re my Steve from the future … and I love you,” she said with guilt.  “But I – you –,” she ran her tongue over her lower lip and swallowed.  “Steve, when I prayed to God every day that I could see you just once more, this is the face I prayed for.  It’s like I’m seeing you for the first time after God answered my prayer.”

Steve understood.  He couldn’t put it into words, but he understood that ache. He felt it, too. When his memories came flooding back, he saw Kayla for the first time as the wife he was madly in love with, but something felt incomplete, like he didn’t get the closure provided by saying goodbye; he didn’t get to say goodbye to her beautiful face in 1990, and he wished he could see it again.  So, he knew that Kayla loved him, even as she looked at him at this moment through the lens of this time, showing her this face.

“You know what I need, Kayla?” his hands still embracing her head.  “I need to kiss those lips. That’s what I need.”

“Then what are you waiting for,” she sighed.

Steve needed no further invitation.  He brought her face to his and kissed her with longing.  It wasn’t the first time they’d kissed in these bodies, but Kayla felt transported.  She parted her lips to him, inviting his tongue to prod hers with long, provocative strokes.  Their kisses were filled with the love of soul mates brought together after a cruel and painful lifetime apart, because here in this room that’s what they were.  Steve wrapped his arms around her and let his right hand drift down to feel the curve of her bottom while Kayla ran her fingers through his long hair.  Then he left her warm mouth to place wet kisses on the flesh of her neck and shoulder while holding the back of her head.  Kayla moaned softly as the sensation heated arousal deep within her. 

Kayla moved a hand to stroke his hardened penis, but even amongst the gift they knew they were living, the uncertainty of it all surrounded them, and she dropped her hand, not following through.  Steve was also holding back.  His body was screaming for her, to have her bare breast against his palm, but he couldn’t quite let himself move his hands where they so wanted to go. 

The fact was that they wanted nothing more than to explore these young bodies they hadn’t lived in and given pleasure to in 19 years, but they were so fearful about what would happen in the morning that they couldn’t shake that from their mind. 

Steve pulled his lips from hers and looked into her beautiful eyes.  “Kayla, I can’t believe I’m sayin’ this, but … I don’t know if we should be doing this.”

“I know,” she looked up at him with her own sexy, half-lidded eyes.  It feels somehow not quite right,” she agreed.  He kissed her, again, and lifted her arms up around his neck so he could rake his palms down over the sides of her ribcage, his thumbs just brushing against the sides of her breasts.  Maybe if I take baby steps, he reasoned with himself.  “But, this just – Steve you feel so good.  You, in this body, it’s so incredible to be with you like this.”

Kayla suckled his bottom lip while Steve’s thumbs inched a bit closer to her stiff peaks.  “Oh, Sweetness, I want you so much.  But we don’t belong here.  Is this natural?  It feels right.”

She placed her palms on his chest and pushed herself away from him slightly.  Looking down, she placed a kiss on the hilt of his tattoo.  “Feels natural,” she said staring at the dagger with love.  Then she dared a lick of his nipple sending waves of thrill through Steve.  “It feels like all those years ago.  I’m just wondering where we’ll wake up tomorrow.”  She looked up at him with eyes that were so impossibly blue he didn’t think the sky could hold a candle to them.

“Kayla.  Baby,” he groaned.  “I can’t tell you how badly I want to see those breasts of yours, feel you, and taste every part of you.”  He made just the subtlest move to lean his mouth down to the upper curve of her breast but then stopped himself.  “But,” he finally brushed his thumb over her taut nipple outlined through the material of her bra and blouse, “I feel it, too,” he said as his wife whimpered with the sensation of where his hands were.  “I don’t know what we’re supposed to do.”

That made Kayla sit up and take notice.  She overcame her desire and answered him.  “You’re my husband,” she said.  “I’m your wife.”  Steve smiled.  Kayla stepped back from him and took down the straps of her jumper, unbuttoned it, then let it pool at her feet, kicking it aside.

“You gonna leave that there?”

Kayla nodded and said, “Yep.”

“The maid’s not gonna be happy with you, baby.”

Without reacting, Kayla then unbuttoned her blouse, took it off, and let it join the jumper on the floor.  The baby let out a sigh that sounded over the monitor, and they both smiled brightly.  Then Kayla looked Steve in the eye and took off her bra, stepped out of her underwear, and added them to the growing pile on the floor. 

Steve took in the vision that was his wife standing before him naked in this body.  She was beautiful.  Her breasts were smaller and although they’d already once swelled with having carried a child, they were still pert and perfect.  The curve of her belly was rounder than it would have been at the loft, but this, along with everything else about her from the curls at her center to the arches of her feet was every bit as beautiful to him as he remembered.  He raked his eye over her before settling back at her one most mesmerizing, feature.  Her eyes.

“Now you see me,” Kayla said.  “That’s something we’re supposed to do.  See each other.  Here.  Now.  In 1990,” she said with still a good amount of incredulity.  

Have I ever loved her more than I do right now?  He didn’t think so. 

“Your turn.”

Steve unbuttoned the rest of his shirt and layed it down in a crumple on the dresser.  He unbuttoned his jeans and pushed them down with the pair of boxers beneath.  He stepped out of them and kicked them over to Kayla’s pile.  Kayla looked at him, gazing at the tattoo first, over his muscled torso, and then down to his hardened penis.  When she looked back up at her husband, the look in his eye made her sway.

“I love you,” Kayla told him.

“I love you more,”

“Oh, I doubt that.”

Steve chuckled.  “I think that’s my line.”

Kayla then got into bed and turned down the covers for him to join her.  Steve got in and she immediately snuggled close against him in a familiar embrace that they’d shared countless times before.  The feel of his naked body against hers was so powerful she was physically affected.  Her core was wet with arousal, her heart fell into steady rhythm with his, and they were the very picture of a perfect fit.  “Now you feel me.  That’s something we’re supposed to do, too.  Can you feel me, Steve?”

“I want to make love to you.”

She embraced him more tightly and said, “I want that, too.  But—“

“But we shouldn’t.”

“I don’t think so,” she said softly.

It only took a minute of them laying naked together for them to realize that there was no way they were going to be able to lie there naked and not be all over each other. 

“Kayla, if we’re supposed to see and feel each other but not make love, then, baby, I’m tellin’ you right now, we’re gonna have to put some clothes on.”  Kayla tilted her head to look up at him with those eyes that he knew felt what he felt, and he didn’t have but a hair’s breadth of willpower left.  “Now, baby.”

They rolled out of bed and swiftly found a white nightgown and pajama bottoms, which they donned in record time, then crawled back in bed.  As soon as their bodies met, Steve kissed her lovingly letting his tongue find hers in sweet velvety strokes.  When they parted, he pulled her back to their snuggled position, feeling her breasts fall through the nightgown against his bare chest. 

Kayla kissed his tattoo before settling against him.  “I want us to make love, Steve,” she said softly, “but somehow, I think we … got it right today.  Being in your arms feels like what I should be doing.”

“I think you’re right, baby, this does feel like the way we’re supposed to be right now.  Me holding you like this.”  Kayla made a sweet sighing noise.  “I can’t speak for tomorrow, though,” he smirked with a leer that Kayla loved.

“Ok,” she laughed, “Deal.”

“Yeah?  Naked today, inside you tomorrow?”

“Sounds wonderful,” she grinned.

They laid in each other’s tight embrace for a bit, their arousal having slowly abated.  Then Steve’s tone became serious.  “Kayla?”

“Mm-hmm?”

He dared the question.  “Do you want to wake up here in the morning?”

Kayla stilled her fingers that were tracing randomly across Steve’s smooth chest. “Do you?”

“I’m asking you.”

She didn’t know what answer Steve was looking for.  She thought about giving him the one she thought he wanted but ultimately went with the truth.  “I don’t know.”

“What would you say if I told you—,” he paused and swallowed, finding his courage. “—that I think I do.”

Whereas she wasn’t sure how she felt a minute ago, now that it was said out loud, she knew that this scared her.  “What about Joe?” her voice heavy.  “If … if we stay here … then we go on with one baby, but we lose another.”

Steve sighed and cursed the lump in his throat.  “Or maybe we won’t lose him.  We get him back when we have him 18 years from now.  We know we have him, so,” his voice cracked, “we just wait for him.”

“Long wait.”

“But we’d get him back.”

Kayla knew the likelihood of this was slim.  “A lot can happen in 18 years, Steve.”

“Maybe we have him sooner, then.”

“Joe is made of that egg and that sperm, which won’t meet before then, and they probably won’t at all,” she said through tears she was trying to hold back.

“Or more babies in between, then.”

“I want Joe,” she buried her head into his chest and finally cried.

“Baby,” Steve consoled her, “I’m sorry I asked.  It’s just … Kayla I want my life back with you so badly it hurts.  I’m sorry, Sweetness, I know it’s selfish, and I do feel so fulfilled today getting this whole day with my girls again, but I want this gift to keep going.”

“No, don’t apologize for how you feel.  I don’t blame you.”  Then she had a thought that scared her even more.  “Steve, if we wake up tomorrow in our bed at home, and all of this is gone, will you be disappointed?”

“No.”  Steve said this with a conviction that left positively no room for doubt.  He lifted her chin to look at him and locked her into a piercing stare.  “No, Kayla.  Never.  I could never be disappointed to be back home with you.  Never, do you hear me?” He gathered her up to him and kissed her with as much strength as the words he was trying to convey.  “Maybe we’ll be here tomorrow and the next day and next week, and then we’ll prevent me from being taken from you, and we’ll start all over again,” he said.  “Or maybe we’ll find ourselves back in our bed with Joe needing his breakfast,” he fully palmed Kayla’s breast for the first time since they’d left 2009, “and our grown daughter hogging the bathroom.”  Kayla laughed, her worry having all but disappeared.  “But Kayla, you look at me.  If that happens and we never see this place – this time – again, I will never be sorry to be with you in 2009.

Kayla looked at her husband and didn’t understand how anyone could ever be as in love as she was.

“Ok?”

“Ok,” she smiled.  “Ok.”

They laid there in their bed in their house in the silence of each other’s arms for what seemed like a long time.  Though it went unspoken, they each knew they were trying not to fall asleep.  The baby monitor hummed through the room casting a comforting lull over them, and somewhere in the distance they heard a dog barking in the night.  It was hard to know which of them fell asleep first, but eventually, after a long while of laying in loving and fulfilled silence, they both succumbed to the darkness of sleep.

Chapter Text

Find Me
Chapter 10

Steve rolled over and reached for his wife.  His hand made contact with her belly, and he pulled her close into the crook of his lap.  The firmness of her bottom felt good against the stiff erection that often came with waking in the morning.  Still enveloped in sleep’s twilight, Steve began grinding himself against her.  Kayla roused to this familiar morning activity and through her own sleepy haze enjoyed the feel of him.  Turning toward him, she allowed her hips to meet his, feeling his hardness through the nightgown against her soft folds beneath it. 

When she moaned, the sound of her voice pierced the silence of their early morning foreplay, bringing both of them out of their building ecstasy and into the immediate here and now.  They froze what they were doing, opened their eyes, and saw that the here and now in question was the same one as when they went to sleep.

“We’re still here,” Kayla whispered.

Steve looked into her eyes and saw the sleep in them.  Glancing over her shoulder then up to the headboard against the sage wall, he knew she was right.  “Looks like it,” he said.  Truth be told, he was amazed.

“I’m kind of surprised,” Kayla said.

“Me, too, baby,” he said, drowsiness lacing his voice.  “Laying here last night, I thought that was gonna be it for us.  We’d wake up back at home.”

Just then the sounds of Stephanie making little sighs in her sleep sailed through the room, and relief flooded through them.  “But we didn’t,” Kayla replied with a squeak of excitement.  “We’re still here, and so is Stephanie.”

Steve leaned in and kissed her lips, his touch was soft and gentle.  Despite the ache in his groin, he controlled his urge to continue what they’d just been unconsciously doing, and she controlled her urge to encourage him.  Then Steve asked himself, why are we still waiting?

“Come here, baby.”  Steve turned his head to see the clock; it was just after 5:30 AM.  Then he gathered her into his arms.  “What time did Stephanie usually get up back then, I forget.” 

“Probably about the same time as Joey does now,” Kayla said.  Steve snickered, and Kayla pulled back and looked at him with curiosity.  “What?”

“Now?  Sweetness, which now are we talking about, the now that we’re from or the now we’re layin’ in, here?

She playfully whacked at him, “You know what I meant.”

“Yeah, this time, but if we’re going to be sticking around, we’re going to have a whole new view of what ‘now’ means.

“Ugh,” she groaned, “you’re going to make my head hurt with this time travel stuff, aren’t you?”

“Don’t talk to me about your head hurting, Sweetness, I’ve got a head of my own hurting right now.”

Kayla giggled and lifted the comforter to look down at the tent that had formed at Steve’s crotch.  “Yeah, you seem to have a little problem down there, Mr. Johnson,” she teased as she reached down and patted the slowly diminishing stiffness.

“Hey!” Steve caught her hand, “just who are you calling little, baby?”

“Gosh.  I think we’re getting a wee bit defensive.”

“Wee?  Now we’re wee, too?”  He put his hand to his heart, verbally wounded.

“Ya know … it’s tomorrow,” she said.  “We’re still here.  Maybe I should fix that.”

In one swift motion, Steve rolled her onto her back and pinned her down beneath him.  “Don’t start something you can’t finish, Sweetness.”

“Oh, I think I can finish it.”

Steve captured her mouth in his and kissed her just as he noticed something big and lumpy down near their feet.  “What is that?” Steve asked.  “Do you feel that?”

“How can I not?” Kayla giggled.

“Not that, baby, this thing is big and fuzzy.”

“Fuzzy?  That doesn’t sound promising.”

Steve leered at her and said, “Keep your pants on, baby, let me check what this thing is.”

Steve reached down and said, “Oh, man, baby, you’re not gonna believe what I found!” 

Just then, Kayla’s déjà vu kicked in again, and she knew exactly what it was.  With a quick inhale of breath, she said, “something has come between us!”

Steve smiled, revealing the stuffed cow that had somehow lived undetected at the foot of their bed till this moment.  “Moo, baby!”  Then he cackled with complete amusement.

Kayla laughed and squeezed the stuffed animal’s middle, resulting in a set of “moo’s” coming from it’s belly.  Just then Stephanie’s little sighs became all out notifications that she was awake and it was time to come get her out of that crib, thank you very much.

“Coming, Little Sweetness,” Steve yelled. 

Kayla smiled over at him.  “You were right, I guess we’re going to have to finish this later.  Darn cow tried to horn in again!”

“Yeah, well, I’ll have a talk with the dude later.”  Kayla shook a finger at it, and Steve laughed.  “Let’s go get our girl.”

Five minutes later, Stephanie had a fresh diaper and was sitting up between Steve and Kayla on the bed whacking at the cow with her tiny hands.  “Baa-baa-baa-baa!” she howled. 

Kayla looked across the room at the mirror on the opposite wall and saw them sitting there under the rumpled covers, the whole family on the bed.  The sight of themselves made her so happy she felt like she was glowing.  Steve felt the same way.  He met her gaze in the mirror and felt a pang of melancholy for a moment, missing his baby son, but he also felt an intense sense of contentment.  Now that they’d woken up here, right where they left off, he felt at such peace.  He was going to get a second chance. He was going to stop himself from being taken, and he wasn’t going to miss a single first.  Not this time.  And as he’d found himself doing a lot since this strange trip began, he indulged in the strong emotions that he couldn’t keep at bay and felt tears sting his eyes.

“I’m so happy Kayla,” he told her in the mirror.  “Look at the gift I was given yesterday.  I got to have my family back.”  His eye burned with tears it wanted to spill.

“And I got to see this face again,” she smiled, cupping his face.  She leaned over and kissed the single fallen tear away, then pulled back to look at this face that her prayers had been answered with. 

Stephanie continued baa-baa-baaing between them, and it was only going to get more insistent as the moments came and went.  “I think this one’s hungry,” Kayla said rubbing her hand over the baby girl’s head.

Steve gently caught her hand and brought it to his lips to kiss her palm.  Then he leaned down and kissed Stephanie on the head.  “Ya hear that, Stephanie?  Time for breakfast again!,” Steve baby babbled to her.  “So, get ready, we’ve got one Dom Perrin-Similac, comin’ up!”

Just as Kayla was pushing back the bedcovers to get out of bed, she felt a strange tug in her gut.  She stopped and said, “Steve … I don’t feel good.”

Just then Steve felt the same wave and looked over at his wife.  “Sweetness …,” he said with trepidation in his voice.  He looked down at Stephanie, and for a split second she was like an image hanging askew.  He heard Kayla say something, but her voice was tinny and indistinct. The last thing Kayla remembered was the feel of stuffed cow’s leg she was gripping in her hand.

In the next blink of their eyes, Steve and Kayla were no longer in their bed.  They were also no longer in 1990.  When their consciousnesses arrived in this new time, there was a physical sensation of landing on their two feet from a small vertical distance, but without the actual descent.  Once again, the change in orientation caused an intense queasiness in Kayla, and this time Steve felt it, too.

Kayla vaguely took in her surroundings and noted that she was in a small space and that Steve was standing right in front of her, steadying himself against the wall.  Her main focus at the moment, however, was not to throw up.  She moaned as her gorge rose, and Steve swallowed hard, knowing if he moved he might vomit.

The moment passed quickly, and Kayla started to become aware of her surroundings.  Unlike the last two times, she knew immediately that they’d jumped.  She also knew exactly where they were.  Steve stood before her in an olive green, sleeveless t-shirt, his long blonde hair brushed back.  He was slightly leaner than the Steve she’d just left behind in bed.  She softly called out his name waiting for the jump effect to pass him by.  When he looked up, his eye found her in a baggy black blazer over a red blouse with her blonde hair pinned up in a clip.

“Steve.  Is … is that you?” she asked as she stepped toward him.

It took no time at all for him to recognize this place.  “Y--yeah,” he stuttered, reaching out for her, needing to make physical contact as soon as possible.  “We’re not in Kansas, anymore.”  He pulled her into his arms and turned his head into her to smell her hair.  Sense memory is a powerful thing, and the scent of her made him hold on tightly.

Kayla couldn’t bring herself to really smile at the jibe that came second nature to Steve when he was under stress that he could not control.  “Yeah, we, ah … we jumped.”

Steve didn’t want to say the words that they were both thinking, but he couldn’t help it.  “Stephanie didn’t come with us.” He couldn’t hide the sadness in his voice.

Kayla was tired of leaving her babies behind, but she was also tired of crying over things she could not control.  “You were right.  Stephanie belonged there.”  Kayla’s eyes filled with tears when she said her daughter’s name, anyway.  “She wasn’t going to be the one who disappeared; we were.”  They stood in the silence of grief for a moment, then said, “Well … at least you’re not dead yet here, either.”

“Nope,” Steve said taking a cleansing breath as they parted.  Looks like we’ve got a big buffer now.  A few years.”

“You know when we are, don’t you?”

“More or less.  I think we’re stuck in the elevator.”

Kayla nodded, and Steve saw her mood continue to darken.  “Are our bodies still there, do you think?” she asked.

Steve thought about it for a moment before nodding his head.  “I think they are.  Don’t you?”

Kayla shrugged sadly.  “I don’t know.  I’d like to think so.  I think that’s all we can do now is hope that we’re there, the us that belongs there.  Taking care of her.”  That was the last they discussed it.  The fact that the bliss they’d been ripped from with the promise it held being too painful to continue thinking about.

Steve seemed to be processing their new location well enough, but for Kayla the sadness of leaving Stephanie back in 1990 lingered into this new place and time three years earlier, and it was coloring her rationality. “I’m not sure what I’m supposed to be feeling,” Kayla said.  “I remember this time with such pain, I don’t want to be here again.”

Steve knew that what he’d done hurt her more than anything he could have done then.  Seeing her now with that same look in her eyes as she had then was like a stab to the heart.  “I didn’t want to push you away, baby.  It was one of the biggest mistakes I’ve ever made in my whole life.”

Kayla looked up at the round indicator lights of the elevator and saw that none of them were lit.  “We’re already stuck.  It’s not going to take too long for those doors to open.  And … I can’t help it.  I feel … hurt.  She shook her head to try to right herself.  She’d gotten over this decades ago.  She knew that Steve was trying to save his brother and give her what he thought was a better husband; a man better than he was.  She’d gotten past this whole ordeal that culminated in her rape years prior.  So, why was she feeling the same emotions now?  It wasn’t like this at the loft or in their house.  But now, she couldn’t help but feel the hurt all over again. 

Steve was thoroughly confused about everything he knew in life to be true right now and wanted nothing more than to crawl into a bed with her somewhere and close his eyes till this whole thing was over.  But he saw the pained look on his wife’s face and worried.

“Baby?  Steve reached out and tipped her chin to look at him.  “Kayla, you’re scaring me.  What’s going through that head of yours right now?”

“Right now?  I know what happened here, and I’m well-past over it in 2009, Steve.  But right now what’s going through my mind is pain from being pushed away,” she said barely above a whisper.  “Given away.  To a man I didn’t love.  By the only man that I ever would in my whole life.”

Steve was speechless.  He knew she didn’t feel this way anymore.  This must be baggage from leaving Stephanie behind or from not knowing what’s going on. 

“Kayla, that’s done.  It’s over, we’re done with that garbage now.”

“Only we’re not, because here we are in the middle of it again.”

“No, we’re not, Kayla.  These bodies are, but we are not.”

“It’s practically the same thing.”

“No, it’s not!” Steve was getting upset. He had to pull his wife out of this funk that he could only  hope to god now was caused by what was left behind.  “This is some kind of – what do you call it, transferring or transference?  That’s it,” he realized with sudden clarity, “this is transference.  You’re upset that we left Stephanie behind, and now we’ve jumped into a bad time in our relationship and you think that’s what’s upsetting you.”

Somewhere inside her, the rational Kayla knew Steve was right and felt a bit of relief about it.  But on the surface, the open nerves that were her emotions at the moment couldn’t get past the anger.

“I loved you, Steve.  And you gave me away.”

“Now you stop it right now,” Steve raised his voice and grabbed her by the shoulders.  “I took you back from him.  I got you back, you came back to me, baby.  You knew how I felt about you the whole time, why am I having to do this again?  It was a mistake. And I paid for that mistake.”

“Yeah, well so did I,” Kayla snapped.

It was like a physical blow.  Kayla’s implication that Steve’s actions caused her rape cut him to the core.  And the look in his eye was sobering to Kayla in the worst way.  It was a look she’d seen in her husband’s eye on a handful of occasions, and it was the most awful kind of look.  That she’d put that look on his face was devastating.  What have I done to him?

“Steve, I’m sorry!  I … I don’t know what’s wrong with me.  Maybe I am looking for someone to blame for jumping away from 1990.  I – I,” she stammered and her eyes started darting around the elevator, “I don’t know why I said that.” Kayla pleaded. 

He watched her backpedal with hurt still in his eye and just wanted to start this jump of theirs over again.  “Stop, Kayla, just stop,” he said softly

“I don’t know why I’m feeling this way,” she put her hand up in her hair and felt that it was up in a banana clip.  “I just … I didn’t understand what was going on when you were pushing me away, and I loved you so much, but you wouldn’t love me back.  But I know why, and I forgave you so long ago. It just came out, Steve, I’m sorry,” she said, her eyes pleading. 

She rested her palms on his chest, and he gathered them up in his own and pushed her gently against the elevator wall. 

“You look at me, Kayla.”  Steve’s voice was very calm and very serious. “I’m hurting, too.  I’m not going to get my family back that we just had there, either.”  His eye was boring into hers.  “Again.  And now here today in whatever year this is, seeing you in this elevator …”  Kayla looked at him, her lips full and starting to quiver.  “I’ve paid for pushing you away, Kayla.”  I’ve paid for my mistake in the worst way any man could pay.  With the blood of his own wife.”

“No—"

“You have no idea how much I wanted you.  You have no idea how hard it was for me to watch what I was doing to you.  It was the hardest thing I’ve ever had to do was give you up.  I died a little every day that you weren’t with me.  I died more the day you told me Jack raped you.”

At that moment, the doors to the elevator opened.  No one entered, and they didn’t move from their position.  The doors gently closed again as Kayla swept her hand down Steve’s left cheek.  She saw the scar below his eye that had been fixed before he went undercover as Daniel Lucas and wanted to kiss it so much.

“Last time we were in this elevator,” Steve continued, “do you know what I wanted more than anything else?”

“What?”

“I wanted to grab you,” he said running his hand up the small of her back.  “I wanted to grab you and kiss you and tell you that you were right.  You told me that you’d always love me and that you knew I loved you, too.”  He braced his other hand behind her head and held his own head just inches away.  “I wanted to tell you that you were right, I did love you, too, and that I didn’t know what to do.  But that I loved you more than anything in this world and to please forgive me for the terrible thing I did, leaving you naked and broken in the bed I’d just made love to you in.  Because it broke me, too.”

Kayla leaned in and kissed Steve’s left cheek and the feel of her lips on the most guarded part of his body healed whatever cross words she’d said.  He pulled her back and roughly whispered to her, “I’m sorry, Kayla.”

“I’m sorry, too,” she whispered back.

Then he crushed his lips to hers and kissed her with all the feeling he’d wanted to the first time they were in this elevator. 

“I love you,” she whimpered through their kisses.  “I love you so much.”

“I love you, too, baby.  God, Sweetness, I love you.”

They clung on to each other through this kiss with desperation and devotion, their tongues tasting each other with velvet demand.  Then with a sudden intrusion, they each felt a tug at their diaphragm that was the last thing they were expecting. 

Their lips parted, and Steve saw in her eyes that she felt it, too. “Uh oh.”

Chapter Text

Find Me
Chapter 11

The last thing Kayla did before the jump was bury her head in Steve’s chest.  An instant later they both felt that the shift had happened again, not just because they felt sick to their stomachs, but also because they were suddenly freezing.  Steve flinched in the sudden chill as Kayla gasped her first of the cold night air as the jump effect passed.

“That didn’t take long,” Steve said fighting the urge to stutter.

Feeling normal again, the first thing Kayla noticed other than the cold was the old brick estate behind them.  Her left hand was caressing Steve’s neck, and she wondered how it got there.  Then she realized that that’s what her body must have been doing before her consciousness jumped into it. 

She felt the hay beneath her and saw it in her peripheral vision and knew where she was.  “Steve,” she smiled.  We’re on our hayride.”  She couldn’t take her eyes off the man who wasn’t actually her husband yet.  “It’s New Year’s Eve 1987.  The year I married—"

“I know what year it is, Sweetness.”  Steve looked into eyes so luminous he could see through them in the moonlight.  “Are we –,” he swallowed, “are we … ok?” he asked solemnly, the very brief but intense last jump fresh in his mind.

Guilt crept into Kayla.  “Of course, we’re ok,” she said softly.  “You were right.  I was so happy in our house,” she shrugged resignedly, “that I … I think I was looking for someone to blame when we were ripped away.”  Steve blew warm air into his fists and smiled sadly at her.  “What I said to you …” Kayla looked down, so upset with herself for snapping at him in the elevator.  “The look on your face … I don’t blame you for the r-ra—“

“Shh,” Steve put the tips of his fingers to her lips.  “Shh.  No more.  Kiss me.”

Steve tilted Kayla’s chin up to him and kissed her with a passion that warmed him from the inside out.  He smelled her lavender soap scent and remembered being with her in the stolen New Years Eve moonlight like it was yesterday; the bliss was short-lived that night, but it was heaven while it lasted.  Kayla remembered the first time they did this when Steve climbed into the cart after her and could barely contain himself before he was on her with abandon.  Their memories fueled them, and soon the feelings they took with them from their unhappy jump to the elevator were all but forgotten.

Steve grabbed Kayla’s hands to warm them in his own when he felt something unfamiliar.  At the loft, the house, and even in the elevator, Kayla felt familiar to him in every way. There was nothing about her that didn’t ring true to all five of his senses.  Until now.  He pulled back and looked down at her hands.  That’s when he saw it.

“What’s wrong?” Kayla asked.

“What’s this?”

“What’s what?

“Oh,” Steve said.  “Right.”

“What?”  Kayla was confused.  “Is something wrong?”

“Your – this ring.  The one you wore when you were …” he breathed a sigh, “married to Jack.”

Kayla looked down at her hand and felt a shiver go down her spine.  She couldn’t say if it was from the cold or from the look of that long-forgotten ring reminding her of the biggest mistake of her life.  The large marquis stone looked foreign on her finger, and she suddenly felt that sense of dread one gets when they don’t know where they put something very important, like a passport or their wallet or … their wedding ring.

“It looks so strange, doesn’t it?  It’s not my ring.”

“It is at the moment,” he said, frustration creeping into his voice. 

Steve started to feel cold again.  He’d hoped he’d left this mistake back in the elevator, but this jump was reminding him of the same time all over again, just as her kisses had started helping him forget it.

Kayla saw this and put her arms around his neck.  “It never meant anything to me but regret.  It never even felt real.  I married him, I said I do.  And I wore this,” she said, running her fingers over the unwanted diamond.  “But it always felt wrong on my finger.  As wrong as that marriage was.”  Kayla looked over at her husband and saw anxiety beginning to flood his features.  “Steve, it’s ok.  I’ll just take it off.”

“And put it where, Kayla?”  He was upset now.

“Well I have a pocket, or something,” she said feeling around her person for a place to put the ring as his leather jacket squeaked around her shoulders.

“Yeah, and then what?  People are going to notice it’s gone.”

Kayla looked at him cautiously.  “What are you saying?  You want me to … you want me to go back in the house?”

“No, I don’t want her to go back in the house!”  But he didn’t know what the alternative was.  “But if you don’t then someone’s gonna come out here lookin’ for you, Kayla!  You’re not – we’re not – together – here.”

“Yes, we are,” Kayla said as she grabbed the front of his shirt, almost as if she were hanging on to him.

“But no one knows that yet!  And if you don’t go in that house in about five more minutes you’re going to be missed.  Hell, you may have already gone in there by now, I’m not sure.”

“No, Steve, I am not going back!”

“Listen, I know it’s hard,” he grabbed her hands feeling that terrible ring, “but that’s what you do, you go back in there –”

“How can I?”

“How can you not, Kayla?

“Knowing what we know now?  Easily.”

Damn it, it’s happening all over again!  “Why did we jump here, goddammit?  What are we supposed to be doing here?!  Going and playing house with a man you don’t love so that we can go through the hell that happened after?  What does that put right?  Nothing, Kayla, not a damn thing!”

“Then I can’t go back in that house, now, can I?”

“Well, what are you supposed to do, just not show up?  Say, ‘Hey, Jack, I realize you don’t know this, but I’ve done this once before and know how it all turns out, so I’m not coming home?’”

“I don’t know,” Kayla said actually mulling that possibility over, “maybe?”  Steve shot her a look that said hell no.  “Well, maybe we won’t be here long enough to worry about it.  I mean, we were in the elevator for about two minutes.”

“Yeah, but we were in 1990 for a whole day.  Who’s to say this won’t last a week this time?”

Kayla sat back against the hay bale and crossed her arms.  “Then you’re saying you want me to go in there to Jack, then.”

“I’m saying I don’t know what we do next, Kayla!” he shouted.  “And I’m saying I want that damned ring off your finger, baby.  I know I’m saying that.”

“Shh, someone’s going to hear you.”

“Well, good, then, that sure would make our decision for us, now, wouldn’t it?” he said lowering his voice slightly as he grabbed her left hand in his and twisted Jack’s ring off her finger.  Kayla didn’t say anything as she watched him lose it over seeing another man’s ring on her finger.  Then she looked on slack-jawed as he hurled it in anger into the trees.

“Feel better?” she asked with a fair amount of relief to have it gone, but also pining for her own beautiful solitaire.

“Yeah,” he retorted arrogantly, “As a matter of fact I do.”  Then he looked over at her with amusement.  “And you do, too,” he undid the snap of the leather jacket, then brought his hand to the mesh front of her dress, running his palm up to caress her neck.  “You know you do.”

Kayla chuckled.  “I do,” she smiled.  “I don’t know where we go from here, but I do.” 

The cold was starting to get to Steve, but a stirring in his groin started to warm him as he looked at her in this unique moonlight illuminating the snow in her hair.  “I know somewhere we can go,” he said.

Kayla gave him a sexy smile then moved his cold hand down from her neck to her warm breast.  “Good,” she said with a sexy voice that beckoned more from him.  “Take me there.”

Steve brought his lips to the alabaster skin of her neck and placed wet kisses from there to her ear, making her sigh.  He draped his left leg over her and thrust his hips toward her while his left hand fondled her firm breast.  There were no walls of uncertainty here, just yearning for the pleasure they wanted to take in each other.  The love they wanted to show each other.  The need they felt to be together.  Kayla brought his face up to hers and kissed him, exploring his mouth with needy sounds of gratification.

That was when Steve heard a rustling just behind him and pulled himself away abruptly to look over at the source of the noise.

“Do you hear someone,” Kayla whispered, realizing that she really was worried that Jack or someone else would catch them. That apprehension bothered her, actually.  Why should I care?  How real is this whole thing?  Very real, she realized for the first time.  This was wonderful and amazing, but also scary and completely uncertain, too.  She understood, now, why Steve thought that maybe she should go back in the house.  Because not doing so would change things, and she didn’t have the slightest idea how to take control of that kind of unknown.

“Yeah, baby,” Steve whispered.  She could tell he was thinking something over, straining to remember something important.  “I think there’s someone in the trees over there.”

Kayla bit her bottom lip.  “Jack?  Do you think it’s Jack?”  Kayla looked over his left shoulder to try to see who was there.

“No,” he said, turning her face to look at him.  “Keep your eyes on me, Kayla.  I don’t want to tip him off that we know he’s there.”

“That who is there?” 

“Ya know those pictures that sent Jack over the edge back then?  They were taken here on this little hayride of ours.  I think whoever took them is lurking in the trees where I just threw that ring.”  He thought about that added wrinkle for a minute.  “That probably made things worse, actually,” he said.  Then he got an idea that almost made his head spin.  “Keep kissin’ me, here, baby, I’ve got an idea.”

“What?”  She asked between smacks, craning her neck to see the photographer.”

“Cut that out,” he said as he kissed her.  “Eyes on me.”

“Mm,” she agreed, “What … what are … what’s your idea?”

“In about ten seconds, I’m gonna go over there so quick he won’t know what hit him and make damned sure those pictures never see the light of day.”

Chapter Text

Find Me
Chapter 12

They were so quiet that Steve was sure he could hear the click of the camera’s shutter.  With every second that ticked by, Steve’s adrenalin drove him into even higher gear over those photos. 

“Be careful,” Kayla mouthed.

Steve was ready to pounce and felt like he could run a mile.  “Don’t you worry, baby, this body is so limber, I’m gonna get to him in three strides,” he whispered. 

With that, he pushed off and leapt toward the trees to his left.  It actually only took two strides.  Not that it mattered; the photographer was so startled by Steve’s sudden pounce that he wouldn’t have been able to react fast enough for six, let alone the two.  The reporter’s brown eyes reflected back at him in shock and a fair amount of fear.

“What the hell do you think you’re doing, man?!” Steve yelled, grabbing the reporter by the lapels of his coat.  “That how you get your kicks?  Taking naughty pictures of people and ruining their lives?  That how you do things?  Huh?!”

“Let me go!”

“Let you go?  You want me to let you go?  Now why would I do that?” he said in a menacing whisper.

Darrel Canby hadn’t been on the job very long, but the young journalist was as a real up-and-comer at The Spectator.   Full of clever ideas for stories that would make the front page.  Also full of clever ideas for how to get a young buck Assemblyman in his back pocket.  He knew how the game was played, and when he saw Jack Deveraux’s beautiful young wife participating in quite the extra-curricular activities with the lowlife from the riverfront, he knew that he had a ringer on the field and would finally get to play.

What he didn’t count on, however, was that Steven Earl Johnson was not a man you wanted on the opposing team.

Now that up-and-comer was nothing more than a deer in the headlights.  He absolutely didn’t know what hit him.

Steve shook him hard by the lapels he was still white knuckling and shoved him against a tree.  “You’re not getting any more pictures, man, you got that?”

“I-I-I don’t know what you’re talking about!”

Steve punched him in the jaw, and the reporter cried out in pain.

“You wanna try that again?”

“You hit me!” he spat out.  “I-I’m gonna file charges against you!”

“Really?  I don’t see anyone here to corroborate your story. 

The reporter glanced over at Kayla, still sitting in the cart.

“Don’t you look at her!” Steve snarled.  “Don’t you fucking look at her!”  But he didn’t shift his gaze away soon enough for Steve, so he hit him again.”

“Steve!”  Kayla called with warning concern. 

“See!  She knows you’re assaulting me!”

“Oh yeah, is that what she knows?  Somehow I don’t think her concern was for you, you sniveling pile of pond scum.”

“He’s right,” she said as she got out of the cart.  “I’m concerned that he’s going to give me a reason to wrap a bandage around another part of him is all.”

“You stay there, baby,” Steve called back to her, then with a dangerous grin he looked back at the man whose pictures sent Jack over the edge from Assemblyman to rapist.  “Ya think you got all the answers.”  The man’s eyes were darting around and landed briefly on Kayla.  “And didn’t I tell you not to look at her?  You’re gonna have to pay for that, now.”  Steve then kneed him in the groin, knocking the proverbial wind out of him.  He sank to his knees and moaned in pain.  “Where’s your camera?”

The man rolled over holding his crotch.

“Answer me! Where’s your camera, pond scum!”

Kayla saw a glint in the moonlight and pointed it out to Steve.  He picked it up and looked it over.  “You digital yet?  Nah, too early isn’t it.  Guess I’ll need to do this old school.”

The reporter had no idea what Steve was saying, his primary concern being the pain radiating in droves from his testicles up through every last pore. 

“You’re gonna have to ask BillyJack to up your budget over at the paper when he takes it over in a couple years, man, ‘cause this thing is about to be rendered useless.”

“You can’t do that …”

Steve squatted down and stared daggers into the man’s wide, brown eyes.  “Oh yes I can.  This is how it’s gonna happen, dude.  You listening?” he asked in a low and dark tone as he grabbed the man’s chin in his hand.  “You put on those listening ears, now, ‘cause I’m only gonna go over this one time.”

The reporter was shaking now, and it wasn’t from the cold.

“This film is never going to get developed.”  He opened the back of the camera and pulled out the 35mm film that was coiled through the bowels of the apparatus, then he held it out to Kayla for her to take.  She walked over to him and grabbed it, putting it in Steve’s coat pocket.  Her heart was pumping as hard as Steve’s was.  “Go back over there, now, baby,” he told her with far less edge in his voice as she followed his instructions. The reporter watched this exchange in attentive silence.  “And this camera,” Steve said as he broke the back of the camera off its hinge, “is never going to be clicking again.”  He then grabbed a nearby rock and crushed it down on top of the camera, smashing it to large pieces.  Steve stood back up.  “Now give me your wallet,” he demanded.

The reporter leaned up on one elbow.  “You’re robbing me?!”

“Did I tell you to talk?  Now you give me your wallet real nice like or I’m gonna have to start fishing in your pockets, and neither one of us wants that.”

The man looked at Kayla with pitifully pleading eyes.  “How can you let him do this!” he said to her, “You’re married to—"

“Dude, you’re dumber than I gave you credit for.”  Steve roughly pulled him from the ground and punched him in the jaw again, this time opening up a nice gash in his lip that started bleeding immediately.  “That’s for looking at her again.  You say one more thing to her or so much as blink funny, I’m gonna rearrange your whole goddamn face.  Now I’m not tellin’ you again.  Give me your fucking wallet.”

The man made sure to look only into Steve’s unsmiling right eye as he reached into his inside coat pocket and handed his wallet over to him. 

“How we doin’ on time ya think, baby?” he called over to Kayla while looking the reporter right in the face. 

“I don’t know for sure, but I think we really need to hurry.”

“Don’t you worry,” he called back. 

Steve rifled through the wallet and found what he was looking for.  “Canby.  Ok, Canby, ya see this?” he asked holding up his driver’s license.  “This tells me where you live.  Now I hope your listening ears are still on, man.  Because not only are the pictures you took tonight goners, but any other little pictures you got hangin’ out in a darkroom or envelope or something somewhere, you know what you’re gonna do with ‘em, dude?  You’re gonna burn ‘em.  And the negatives, too.  Ya know how I know that?  ‘Cause I’m coming to pay you a visit tomorrow morning, and if you’ve got anything I don’t like, then you’re gonna get introduced to my nasty side.  This here right now?  I’m still a pussycat right now, so that sure would be a bad day for you if you were stupid enough to get on my bad side.”  Canby just glared at Steve in stunned silence as he tried to shrink back as much as he could into himself.  “Then after tomorrow’s little visit,” Steve continued with a solid shake to drive it home, “all those plans to follow us and take more pictures … never gonna happen.  Because if you do, I’ll know.  And I’ll come after you with more than just a little slapping around.”

Canby was still staring Steve right in the face when he closed the wallet and roughly placed it back into the pocket where it had come from. 

“That pretty face of yours is gonna need a couple stitches,” Steve said.  “Don’t even think of getting them at the Emergency Center.”  Canby nodded nervously.  Steve gave him a final threatening look, then opened his blazing green eye wide and said, “I know where you live, Canby.”  Then he let him go with a final shove.  “Now get the hell out of here you piece of trash.” And with that, the demoralized reporter ran as fast as his damaged body could take him. 

Steve waited just the few seconds it took to verify that Canby ran away from the house and not into it before he crouched down to pick up every last piece of the camera. 

“Steve!” Kayla called, “are you ok?”

“Never better, baby,” he said, hopped up on an adrenalin high as Kayla slipped down off the hay.  “Here, we’ve gotta take these with us,” and shoved the camera pieces into the leather pockets of his jacket.

“You must be freezing by now,” she said as she slipped the jacket off her shoulders. 

“No, you’re gonna need that, we’re getting out of here.”

“So, I’m not going to Jack?” she asked with a wide smile.

“No way, Sweetness.  There’s no way we’re making this mistake again.  I couldn’t take it if—“

Kayla cut off the rest of his sentence with a kiss full of passionate desire.  She pulled him to her by his shirt and devoured his mouth with a hunger that made it hard for Steve to see straight. She wanted him right now and was ready to crawl right back up into that hay.  She wrapped her arms around him and held on tight.

“Oh, baby,” he said as he pushed Kayla back into the cart with the length of his own body upon hers.  Sweetness, I don’t know what I did to deserve this,” he panted between kisses, “and I’d love to make love to you right now on that hayride.”  He ran his hands down her back to push her bottom into him.  “But if we don’t go right now, someone’s gonna find us.  Plus,“ he gave her one last tongue-filled kiss that tasted of the wine she’d had earlier in the evening, “I admit it … I’m freezing.”

Kayla smiled.  “Ok,” she said.  “Get me out of here.”  Then she took a beat and said, “But where are we going to go?”

Steve looked around and saw the stables.  “Well, if we want hay, there’s more of it in there,” he said with a smirk. 

“No, Jack will look there.”

“Back to the loft?”

“No, Jack lives there with me right now, remember?”

“Right,” he said annoyed.  Then he realized something that would have been obvious if his brain wasn’t still thinking like 2009.  “Yeah, but I don’t live there yet, Sweetness.  Why don’t we just go to my place?”

The suggestion evoked such a strong pang to see the place again that she couldn’t wait to get there.  She smiled and practically pulled him as she started off with a look over her shoulder.

Just then she stopped dead in her tracks as a voice called out into the night air screaming Kayla’s name.

“Oh my God,” she whispered.  “It’s Jack.”

“Shit!  I knew we were taking too long!”

“What do we do, she asked in fear?”

Then he grabbed her hand as they took out through the night.  “Run.”

Chapter Text

Find Me
Chapter 13

The luminous moonlight set off the thicket of clouds in pink tones making the night shine in an unsettling eeriness.  As they ran from the Deveraux estate and into the next, they felt relatively safe from the immediate threat of being found by Jack. But the real danger of being seen by the wrong person in this time that they weren’t sure exactly how to navigate yet still hung over them.  

They stopped to catch their breath in the shadows of a lawn several acres down from where they’d started.  Steve saw how much Kayla was sticking out in that shimmering, creamy dress and knew she was going to attract attention.  “You’re going to get noticed in that dress, Kayla.  I’m not sure you’re gonna make it on foot, anyway, those shoes weren’t exactly made for walkin’,” Steve said.

“Yeah,” Kayla smiled wryly, “well how about by car?”  Steve looked at her quizzically, and she held out a set of car keys.  “Look what I found in your pocket,” she said full of triumph.

“The bluesmobile!  Oh, baby, did I drive that thing here that night?” he thought back.  “Yeah, I must have.  That was a long line of cars all the way down the block, I think I remember that.  No way I would have parked it close.  Where’d I leave it?”

They chanced heading out to the street where the handsome estates each began with a gate at the mouth of each driveway and snuck out through a pedestrian door that locked from the inside.  Kayla hid behind a bush as Steve took a hard look down the street.  There he saw it, a lone black car at least three more acres down.  That’s got to be it, he thought.  Man, I didn’t take any chances, did I?   He looked back at Kayla.  “Found it!  Come on, let’s run, baby!”

Not only did they successfully find, unlock, and drive away in the car, but they made it all the way back to Steve’s apartment without being seen.  It would have taken hours on foot tonight, but it only took ten minutes by car. 

Once in the alley, Kayla’s anticipation to be in Steve’s apartment was almost physical.  She could barely contain her nervous energy as Steve fumbled with keys he hadn’t used in 21 years. When they finally walked through the door and locked it behind them, they were both stunned at the sight of it. 

“Am I dreaming,” Kayla asked with a shaky voice?

“Don’t start that, again, Sweetness, you know we’re not.”

Kayla wasn’t expecting nostalgia to hit her quite so hard, but she couldn’t help a strangled cry from escaping her.  She didn’t remember taking off Steve’s jacket or stumbling down the concrete stairs, but the next thing she knew she was making her way toward Steve’s bed.  She stood over it and just stared at it with a sort of amazement. 

Still unmoved from the front door, Steve raked his eye over his old apartment.  It wasn’t the first time he found himself in this situation, but still, it took him a moment to get past the emotions the place evoked.  When his eye finally rested on his wife, he watched as her face took on a look of hunger at his bed.  Then she looked up at him and beckoned.  “Come here,” she demanded.

He ran down the stairs and into her arms like a thirsty man in a desert. They were here in his apartment in a time that was dangerous and exciting, and he was fast becoming crazy with need for her.

As they kissed with delirious sexuality they pawed at each other’s clothes in an effort to rid themselves of them.  Steve’s actions defending her honor against that horrible reporter made her weak in the knees for him.  She was heady thinking of how Steve told the creep not to look at her then beat him up when he looked anyway.  The way he protected her tonight from something that would ultimately lead to one of the most traumatic experiences of her life aroused her so strongly that she wanted to devour every inch of him.  She unbuttoned Steve’s shirt anxiously, her long nails making her fingers feel clumsy and slow.  Then she kissed Steve’s tattoo and traced his nipple with the tip of her tongue.  Steve sucked in his breath and felt himself immediately get hard. 

Kayla moaned indulgently when she thought of the sound of the film being unspooled from the camera … that was the sound of a changed future.  That was the sound of a whole new outcome in their lives.  It was a sound that made her yearn for his touch on her body. 

Steve placed a wet kiss on the tender flesh joining her neck to her shoulder.  “I love you, Sweetness.  God, I want you so bad.”

Kayla reached down to stroke his rock hard penis, the thoughts of Steve’s actions driving her mad with desire.  He reacted by nipping at her tender skin then bathing each bite with the warm wetness of his tongue.

“Steve, you what you did tonight … I … it was so incredible,” she panted.  She undid the top button of his jeans and shoved her hand down to grip his naked length.  The feel of her fingers around him drove him wild.  “You’ve mellowed, but I’m glad your temper ran so hot tonight,” Kayla said, her voice sultry and low.  ‘Cause what you did to him, Steve … to protect me … it …”

“It what?” Steve was breathing hard as Kayla stroked him.

“It turned me on,” she said.  “So much.”

“It did, huh?” Steve smiled as he held on to her hand from outside his jeans and guided her ministrations. 

“Mm-hmm,” she nodded.  Kayla moved her head to offer up her neck to him.  He licked the curve of her ear and sucked on her lobe.  Kayla moaned as she thought more about what their future could be like now that were together so much sooner.  No more lying.  No more sneaking around.  No more Jack in my bed.  No more rape.  No more …”

“Oh, baby,” Steve moaned as he unzipped her dress and slipped it off her shoulders so that it hung at her waist. 

No more …

“I’ve missed these,” he said while cupping her breasts and squeezing them.

What else is there going to be no more of?  What if we did too much?  What if it was the wrong thing?

Kayla was suddenly terrified of what they’d just done, the gravity of it making the hairs stand up at the back of her neck.  It was a weird limbo to be in, fear gripping her while remaining incredibly turned on.  She wanted him to keep doing what he was doing to her, but the other thoughts were slowly taking over, making her fearful of every new minute of unknown.

Kayla felt her control start to slip.  She kissed her husband, desperately trying to shake off this dampening line of thought, then laced both hands through his hair with a wicked voracity.  He moaned in pleasure as she ground her hot center against the thigh he’d shoved between her legs.  He knew she was wet and wanted to reach into her underwear and slip his finger inside her.  Kayla wished he would, as she was feeling more and more unstable with this change to the future and grasped at anything she could to not fall down this sudden rabbit hole.  

“I need to feel you, Steve.  I need to feel that you’re real.  That this is all real.”

“It is!” he said, grabbing her shoulders.  “It’s real.  I’m real, Kayla!”  Then he crushed his lips upon hers and kissed her hard.  “We’re real!  I promise we’re real, Sweetness.”

“I know we are!  But I need to feel you!” she raised her voice, feeling desperate for reasons she couldn’t put into words yet.  He reached behind her and started to shove her dress down over her hips.  Kayla kicked off her shoes and finished the job, ridding herself of the dress and her nylons.  Steve sat on the edge of the bed and didn’t wait for her to take off her bra and underwear before roughly yanking her toward him to straddle his lap.  She was glad he wasn’t gentle. She needed to feel the force of his physical power to stay sane. 

Steve placed kisses up her sternum to the hollow of her neck as he slipped his left hand into her bra and ran his thumb over her nipple.  When he felt her peak beneath him Steve couldn’t contain himself and became nearly crazed.  He lifted her breast out of the bra and sucked it aggressively it into his mouth, running his tongue around her with selfish need.

“You taste sweet, baby, you know that?”

Kayla whimpered, then Steve placed his hands under her bottom and pulled her toward him in a consistent rhythm.  He was intoxicated with the feel of his erection against the roughness of his jeans and craved the tight warmth of being inside her.

“I feel you Steve!” she moaned.  But she was losing the war with the fear that had taken hold of her.  She tried to hold on, to make her love for him and her sexual desire for him push it away.  But the fear weeded its tendrils through her brain and slowly won the war. “Oh, I … I feel … I …,” her rhythm slowed, and her voice had a quality Steve recognized with alarm.  Her thrusts had all but stopped, and she now sat still atop Steve’s throbbing bulge.  Then she looked him in the eye and gasped for air.  “Steve …?”

His sexual need burned hot as he ached to impale himself inside of her.  But Steve knew his wife in any time.  He knew every intonation of her voice.  He knew that face looking back at him.  And he knew with absolute certainty that she was about to cry.  And despite how much his body wanted her, his concern for her overcame throb in his groin. 

“Sweetness,” he said gently.  Kayla looked back at him, her beseeching eyes quickly filling with tears.  He raked the back of his hand over her cheek as his other arm encircled her waist.  “Baby, you do what you’ve got to do.  I’m right here.”  She bit her bottom lip as it began to quiver.  “Come on, now.  It’s ok.”  Steve’s eye was so gentle as she collapsed in his arms and began to sob.

“That’s it, baby, let it out.  Shh,” he soothed as he rubbed his hand over her back while threading his other hand through her hair.  Steve didn’t know why she was crying, but it didn’t matter right at that moment.  He just wanted to hold her and wait till she calmed.  She hadn’t moved from her straddled position with her legs wrapped around his waist, but his hardness had abated, and she felt light in his arms as he gently rocked her.  He loosened the butterfly pins that were in Kayla’s hair and brushed it out with his fingers so he could stroke it softly. 

Soon Kayla’s weeping calmed.  Steve guided her lips to his and tenderly kissed her while wiping away her tears with his thumbs.  “You want to tell me what that was all about, Sweetness?”

Kayla ran her fingers over Steve’s lips and untangled herself from his lap.  She knew how aroused she’d made him when she abruptly stopped what she was doing and started bawling instead.  “I’m sorry,” she said glancing meaningfully at the lap she’d just been in feeling guilty for the selfishness.

“There’s nothing to be sorry for, Sweetness.  Just forget that and tell me what just happened to you here.”

“I’m not sure,” she said very softly.  “I … I think I’m scared.”

“What are you scared of, Sweetness?”

“I’m scared of what we did out there.  Of what’s happening.”  Kayla ran her hands up and down Steve’s thigh as she spoke, needing to have physical contact with him.  At the Deveraux house, with that reporter … what you did.”

“Yeah, baby?”

“It was amazing what you did for me.  To protect me and defend me.  It turned me on.”

“Ok,” he smiled, “so far so good, right?”

“And when we got here,” she continued, “it was just so … so real. Then I saw you up there, and I wanted you so bad.  But then I couldn’t help but think … that’s not how it happened.  That’s not how any of it happened.  Don’t you see, we did something that we didn’t do the first time, and it hit me that I don’t know what to do now.  I started to lose track of reality in my head and I got scared.  Kayla started to cry again, “and I tried to make it go away … with you.  I tried to make the sex make it go away.”

“Oh, baby.”

“I couldn’t help it,” she cried.  “I just needed to be with you, to feel you making love to me.”

“Don’t apologize for that, baby.”

“But then I made it worse, because I just couldn’t stop wondering if what we did was a good idea.”

“The reporter, you mean?  Beating him up?”

Kayla grinned through her tears and shrugged a nod.  “It was more than that, though.  It was about what it would mean in the future.  I mean, yes, I ran away and didn’t go back in the house, but the big change is that film.  Steve, it’s never going to be developed. It’s never going to go to Jack.”

“That’s a good thing!  Look at all the things that aren’t going to happen now.”

“Exactly!  There’s so much I’d wished I could change over the years.  Being raped, being deaf, losing you.  But, Steve,” she was crying harder now.  “I don’t want to change a minute of us.  Of who we are to each other and what we have together.”

“Baby, please—“

“Listen to me!”  Being raped … was a horrible thing.  I couldn’t go through that again.  But, it did make me a stronger person.  And more importantly, it made us stronger as a couple.  And if that hadn’t happened then Jack wouldn’t have done all the things he did after that, and then Harper wouldn’t have had a reason to hate me and plan that attack. I wouldn’t have been deaf.  Look how much that helped define us.  How would we have had this?” as she made the sign for courage.  

Steve’s eyes started to mist as his wife’s words sank in.  He hadn’t considered that there could be negative consequences.  He was just focusing on preventing those photos from flying Jack into the rage that resulted in him raping his wife.

“You told me that when you were in the coma after you donated your kidney to Jack that you knew we were soulmates.  There won’t be any kidney transplant now.  How does what we did tonight with that film risk what we have now,” she said.  “What does it mean down the road?”

“We are soulmates, Kayla.  We’re meant to be together, nothing can change that.  All this means is that we’ll be together quicker.  We’ll be married quicker.  We’ll have Stephanie quicker.”

“Stephanie!  How do we know we’d even have her?  How do we recreate a life that one instant brings?  That instant is supposed to happen in 1990.”

“But weren’t we going to change the future back in 1990?” That jump was only a couple short hours ago in real time, but it felt a lot longer to Steve with his head swimming in sudden uncertainty.  “When we were going to prevent me from being taken and get our 16 years back?  Weren’t we gonna do it then?”

“But we jumped first and didn’t get the chance.  This time we really did.  We’ve changed the future.  And I don’t know what comes next!”

“No, Kayla.  Baby, we can’t think that way.  Look, whatever’s happening to us, here—“

“What is happening to us, Steve?  What?!  How many places have we been now, four?  Five?”

He grabbed Kayla hard and gave her a shake.  “Stop it!” he hissed.  “You’ve gotta stay with me, Sweetness, ‘cause I can’t do this by myself!”  Kayla stilled and looked him in the eye, searching for something to ground her.  “You’re right, we made a change. But what if that was how it was supposed to happen back then?  What if Jack was never supposed to see those pictures?  And you were never supposed to go back in the house?  And now we’re able to do it the right way?”

There was a brief but fully charged silence between them.

“The road not taken,” Kayla said. 

“That’s right, Sweetness.  We took a chance back on that hayride.  Now, what if we’re finally on the right road?  Did you ever think of that?”  Kayla looked around the basement apartment and found peace in his words, and Steve was relieved when he felt her body ease up.  “I don’t know if we did the right thing or not, but it’s done, and we can’t go backwards.  I stopped you from being raped.”  He paused a minute and let her take that in.  “Kayla, I’m nervous, too, but if we sit here in fear, then we’re not going to get anywhere.  Let’s just do the best we can on these jumps and hope we’re doing the right thing.”

“You think we’re going to jump again?”

“I don’t know what to think, Sweetness.  Maybe we got it right here and we won’t jump anymore and reboot ourselves.  Or maybe we’ll jump again.  I don’t know. 

Kayla wiped the last of her tears away and crawled into Steve’s arms.  He held her like that for several minutes thinking about what she said.  The truth was she was right.  This change might mean disaster.  But it also might not.  Maybe we put it right.  Then he thought of Canby laying on the ground holding his meager manhood in his hands.  “You know what, baby?”

“What?” she asked.

“I’m glad I kicked that guy’s ass.  He deserved it.  I’m not sorry for that.”

 “I’m not either,” she said with satisfaction.  “It was hot, and I was proud.”  He held her tighter.  “I’m just scared of what it means.”

Kayla took a deep breath and realized she was still in her bra and underwear and chuckled.  “Well,” she shrugged as she pulled back from him, “The first problem we’ve got is that I don’t have any clothes here,” she said gesturing to herself.

Steve leered tentatively at her.  “Well, baby, “he grinned, “I’m thinkin’ you’re not gonna need any.”

She smiled, then let her eye wander to the silver chain around his neck, following it down to what dangled at the end.

“My ring,” she whispered.

It was surreal to see it there. 

“I remember this getting me through months of being apart from you,” Steve said, hooking it onto his pinky.  He took the chain off his neck and opened the clasp.  “I think it’s time it went back to its rightful owner, don’t you?”

Kayla nodded, “Yes.”

“That’s the first thing this change can mean,” Steve said as he slipped it onto her finger and kissed her hand.  “I do,” he said with a smile.

Kayla laughed and said, “I do, too.”

“Feel better, baby?  I know I do,” he said placing her palm on his cheek.

Kayla nodded.  “I don’t feel so naked now.”

“What’s wrong with naked?”

Kayla laughed and put her arms around his neck.

“How about we seal this with a kiss, here?”

“Well, it is New Year’s Eve,” she said.  “Then maybe we can finish what I started?”

“I like that idea, Sweetness.”

They shared a long lingering kiss in the first morning hours of 1988 hoping they wouldn’t jump in the middle of it.  And they didn’t.  They did jump out of their skin, however, when a pounding at the door startled them half to death.

“Steve, open up, it’s me. I need to talk to you!”

Steve was shocked at the voice outside the door.  “It’s Jo,” Kayla whispered.  They didn’t move.  It was like at the loft with Caroline, only this time the stakes seemed a lot higher.

After the heavy conversation and tears and finally calming her down only to be left with his own misgivings amidst the newfound stirring in his groin, Steve was not emotionally ready to see his mother.

“I’m not in the mood for being ignored right now, Stephen Earl, now open up this door!”

“Uh … Jo, now is not a good time,” he called up.

“I’m not leaving ‘till you open this door!”

“I think you should let her in,” Kayla said.”

Steve felt very out of sorts with the prospect of seeing her in this time but he didn’t know how to get out of it.  “Ok, uh, hide in the bathroom,” he said as his mother continued to pound on the door.

“This is feeling awfully familiar,” Kayla said as she scooped up her clothes and threw them in the bathroom. 

“Yeah hold on!” Steve yelled.

“Wait, I don’t want to be naked in there.”

Steve slipped off his shirt and gave it to her.

“Stephen!”

“I’m, uh … I’m comin’, Ma-- Jo!”

Steve kissed her and then pushed her toward the bathroom before he bounded up the steps two at a time. 

“Where's Kayla?” Jo hollered when Steve opened the door. 

Steve had spent a lifetime separated from his mother.  First he was separated by an orphanage, then by a madman.  In 2009 she’d gotten so much older, and he’d just tried his best to be a good son to her since he’d come back.  But here in this time, he saw a woman that was young and every bit the spitfire that he remembered.  And like Kayla with her mother at the loft, Steve had a bit of an emotional moment.  He knew he had to control it, though, and he wished Kayla was by his side right now and not hiding in the bathroom.  All of this registered on his face as something that looked very strange to Jo. 

“Don't look at me like that, ‘cause I know she's here.”

Why are we hiding?  Everything is different now.  Steve didn’t want to lie to his mother, and honestly he was kind of exhausted.

“Kayla,” he called to her sullenly.

Kayla came out of the bathroom in Steve’s buttoned shirt with bare legs beneath.  “Hello Jo,” she said feeling a little exposed.  “It’s … wonderful to see you.”

“Don’t give me that.  What in the devil's name do the two of you think you're doing?

Kayla tried gamely to cover their tracks.  “I came by to—“

“Don't, Kayla, I know better,” Jo cut her off. 

“Jo,” Steve said in a tired voice that Jo, frankly, didn’t recognize on him, “whatever it is, can it wait till tomorrow?  Kayla and I are beat and just wanna go to sleep.

“I'm not exactly fresh as a daisy myself,” Jo snapped.  “All I wanna know is why you snuck out with Kayla tonight.”

Steve sighed heavily.  “I’ve got everything under control, can we please just talk in the morning?” 

Kayla could see that Steve was having a hard time but wasn’t sure what to say.  So, she waited it out another minute to see how it would play out.

“Oh come on, Steve, I saw you.  Now I know how much this has cost you to lose Kayla, but if you go chasing after her in the middle of the night and Bil--.  Steve, she’s somebody else’s wife.”

“No, Mama, she’s my wife,” he said finally raising his voice.

Jo was a bit stunned at the use of the word “Mama,” which always made her heart melt no matter how angry he may have been when he used it, and she didn’t say anything for a moment.

Kayla decided now was the right time to interject.  “Jo,” she said, “I know.”

“You know …?

“About Jack.  I know Jack is Billy.”

Jo looked at her son with questioning eyes not sure just what she should say.

“I told her the whole story,” Steve confirmed.

“Steve,” she whined, “You shouldn't have done that.”

Steve took his mother’s hands in his own and looked at her.  Jo was shocked at the gesture and momentarily forgot why she’d come.  “Mama,” he said.  “This whole thing is done now.  It’s time we tell Jack the truth.”

“No,” she said somewhat detached as she felt her hands tenderly in those of her son.  “Y-y-you can’t do that, son.”

“I've got everything under control, Mama,” he said, again, starting to lead her toward the stairs.  “End of discussion.  Over.  We’re telling him.  But not tonight.  Tonight, Kayla and I need to be alone.  You come back in the morning, and we’ll all do it together. Tell him you’re his mama, too.”

“What?  No!  It’ll kill him!”

“No, it won’t, trust me, I know.  Now you go back to the Deveraux house and tell Jack that you found Kayla safe and sound and that she’ll be at the house first thing in the morning to explain everything.  Then tomorrow the three of us will go over there and make this whole thing right, ok?  Please, Mama,” his voice was starting to falter slightly, but only Kayla noticed.

Jo started to walk up the stairs in a haze of confusion still holding on to her son’s hands. 

“Wait!” Kayla stopped them.  Then she walked over, half naked and all, and hugged Jo.  “I love you,” she said. 

“Kayla,” Jo gasped with emotion.  “Well, I – I love you, too.”

“See you in the morning,” she said as she physically removed Jo’s hand from Steve’s, as they were both unconsciously hanging on.

Right before Jo was out the door she whirled back around.  “I forgot to tell you!” she said.  “The police came in the middle of the party and arrested Melissa. They think she's responsible for poisoning you, Kayla.”

“Oh crap,” Steve groaned.

“I forgot about that,” Kayla said.

“This is a gonna be a bigger mess than I thought,” Steve replied.

“What?” Jo asked.

“Nothing,” Steve and Kayla said in unison.

“What are you kids up to, here?”

“Please, Jo—Mama,” he said and hugged her.  “Tomorrow.  See you tomorrow right here. We’ll all go together.  Everything’s gonna work out fine, ok?”

“O—Ok.” She mumbled.

“’Night, Mama.” 

After Steve gently closed the door and locked it behind her, Jo stood there for a full minute with no idea what really just happened in there.  But she trusted her son and decided that if what’s done is done, then she’d better just minimize the damage as best she could and go off to do what they asked her to.

On the other side of the door Kayla led Steve silently back down into the room.  She sat down on the bed, then Steve sank down to his knees and looked at her.  “That was my mama.”

Kayla cupped his face in her hand.  She comfortingly ran her thumb over the scar below his patch and asked, “Are you ok?”

Steve smiled sadly at her and nodded.  Then changed his mind and shook his head.  Then he laid his head in his wife’s lap, and cried.

Chapter Text

Find Me
Chapter 14

The last of Shenanigans’ intoxicated customers stumbled out of the restaurant and into the back alley where, if they were lucky, they could hear the faint bluesy tones of a harmonica drifting through the early morning air.  Shenanigans’ bartender, Joey, smiled as he heard the familiar sound and thought about stopping by to say his last Happy New Year of the night.  But Joey just let him be, too tired to really think of much other than his bed.  Steve, too, lay exhausted in his bed, Kayla’s warm body snuggled up against him as she listened to him play.  She’d been the one who suggested he look for his harmonica; she knew it always helped ease his demons to blow through the finely crafted reeds of his harp and hear the melody hum through him.  Sure enough, when he opened the drawer of his nightstand, there they were.  He picked up his favorite one through the years, a standard 10-hole.  He had just used this one to play a tune for his baby boy a couple weeks ago; it had fared so well over the years.  Now, he placed the far shinier instrument of 1988 to his lips and, rather than blow, he chose to draw first, inhaling the minor chord in an effort to quiet the sweet sadness he felt upon seeing his mother.

Steve and Kayla were having a hard time controlling their emotions during these jumps.  They seemed to be feeling everything twice as strongly as they should.  Tonight, for Steve especially, every sense seemed heightened. What he saw and heard and touched lit a fire under him.  Every smell evoked his sense memory.  There was nothing nefarious about it, it was simply the wistfulness of reminiscence.  It was a form of homesickness, and they both knew it. 

Steve had not handled the long forgotten visit from his mother well, and it took all his control to get through it as well as he did.  Seeing her in her prime like this – happy, healthy, no longer broken, young enough to really live – was very poignant for him.  He was completely affected by the strength in her tone of voice and the clarity of its pitch.  Kayla’s concerns weighed heavily on him, as well, and he was momentarily panicked with what his now unknown future would bring (or not bring).  Kayla had caressed a comforting hand across the back of her husband’s head as he wept in the safety of her lap.  Her loving arms soothed him so well; she knew how he felt.

Now Kayla traced her fingers over Steve’s chest and relished the feel of his body solidly supporting hers.  She had accepted that they’d made a big change and was calmer now, because who knows that they didn’t set something right; that maybe that was how it was supposed to be in the first place.  Not that she wasn’t still scared, because she was.  They both simply didn’t have any other choice but to move on and let the chips fall where they may.

Now as they lay in bed sharing a set of pajamas that belonged to this Steve in this time, they were completely spent.  The current of their arousal hadn’t completely dissipated and now ran somewhere not too far beneath the surface.  But the fatigue these bodies were facing was stronger.  Steve fell asleep with his harmonica in one hand and his wife in the other, while Kayla followed almost immediately thereafter. 

They held each other in the deepness of sleep for the next five hours.

Just before 8am, Steve sleepily reached for Kayla coming up only with rumpled sheets.  He opened his eye forcing himself to alertness and called out for her.

“I’m right here,” she softly reassured him from the doorway beside the bed.  “I just had to go to the bathroom.”

“Oh, baby,” Steve huffed as he layed back heavily onto his pillow.  “You scared me.” 

“I’m sorry,” she smiled sweetly at him.”  The sounds of the flushing toilet and squeak caused by the rush of water through the pipes stirred more memories in him as Kayla crawled back into bed with the man she’d wait another year before she’d marry.  Just then a thought struck her.  Things are different now … maybe we won’t have to wait to marry.

Kayla draped her leg over Steve, her knee putting pressure on his balls, which instantly tightened and sent a happy thrill though his already considerable morning erection.  As she rested her head in the crook of his neck, she ran her hand down from his chest past his abs and down to lightly stroke her husband’s penis.  They couldn’t help letting sleep take them last night, the heaviness draining them.  But their sexual needs were left unmet, and now that they were awake, their appetites picked up right where they left off.  It was amazing how it didn’t matter where they were, when they were, or what they were doing, Steve never failed to want to nestle himself deep inside Kayla’s slick home. 

Kayla wrapped her fingers around the steel between Steve’s legs and tilted her head up to run her warm, wet mouth over the tender flesh of his neck.  He thrilled to her touch and wound his left hand through her hair, holding her face against him so she could ply more of her kisses there.  When she started rubbing her folds against his thigh, Steve was overcome with sexual need.  He rolled her over as Kayla pulled down his pajama bottoms, setting his steel cock free as he kicked them off into a tangle at his feet.  He quickly centered his naked body over her, separating her legs with his thigh.  Words were neither needed as he thrust his cock back and forth over her wet folds beneath the surface of her underwear, nor wanted as she met each one of his thrusts with one of her own.  She wrapped her legs around him and felt Steve reach down and pull her underwear and over her rear.  She wanted him inside of her right this very minute now, and he wanted nothing more than to thrust himself into her with carnality. 

Steve thirsted for her and needed to consume her.  He ran his open mouth down her jaw, biting at it with lustful nips before kissing each spot he’d bitten. When he got to her breasts he sucked one in where it beaded under the lashing of his flicking tongue. He hadn’t touched this body in a long time, and the feel of her in his hands and in his mouth was incredible.  Kayla moaned loudly, knowing she was free to do so in the safety of Steve’s apartment as he squeezed her other breast and rolled her dusky tip between his fingers.  The sound of his wife’s sexuality drove him out of his mind. 

That’s when Kayla felt it.  Alongside her building orgasm that was ready to crest in mere seconds was a pull at her diaphragm that by now Kayla knew as the last thing she was going to feel in this body.  She screamed Steve’s name as she pulled his head up to look at her. She saw in his eyes that he felt it, too, and yelled, “No!” whimpering his name with desperation to climax in this body and milk his, as well.

Steve felt a sudden flare of raw and confused intensity along with a healthy dose of anger that the jump was imminent.  He was so on fire that he couldn’t harness all the thoughts going through his brain. 

He wanted to spill himself inside of her and feel her contract hard around him
And he wanted to know they did the right thing last night
And smell her on his sheets
And end this lie to Jack
And make love to this woman all day in this bed
And feel the music on his lips and taste her on his tongue
And not jump from here so soon and enjoy his youth again
And jump away as soon as possible and not have to face the uncertain future

But most of all, as he felt himself slip away from this time, he wanted to feel her come for him and know he would be the only man to pump his seed into her over and over again. He just wanted to come hard as she held him, dammit!

Steve wrapped his strong arms around Kayla and whispered “I love you” into her ear as they felt their consciousnesses leave these bodies behind in 1988.

When they next opened their eyes, they were in another bed in another time in another country. 

Sitting upright in a narrow bed, Kayla reached out so immediately for Steve that the haze of the jump effect had barely even begun to make its queasy presence known.  She swallowed her gorge and moaned sickly, “Baby … mmf”

Steve was right next to her, his raging erection apparently having followed him from his apartment, as this body’s penis was as rock hard as the last one.  Still, the jumps were never fun, and the uncertainty of it made his priority getting a solid grip on his wife. 

“I’ve got you, Sweetness,” Steve said as he instinctively pulled her toward him, his arms already around her when they arrived.”  It was like they didn’t even need to visually see each other.  They arrived and felt each other’s familiar forms.  These bodies were not in the middle of ecstasy, but their conscious awarenesses were.  Far more powerful than the nerve endings being stimulated, their desires had not abated, and the frustration level was high on arrival.

While their bodies found each other, their eyes searched the room. Kayla turned to look at Steve for the first time, and saw immediately that this was earlier than they had just been.  It’s not that the physical clues, like lack of beard or hair length, had tipped her off; she just felt it as his green eye bored into her with the same intensity that he wanted to drive his cock into her with. 

The small space was clearly a hotel room, and Kayla spied the rumpled sheets of another bed just to her right as the sound of keys jangled on the other side of the hotel room’s door.  Kayla had a pretty good idea where they were.  “I think this is—“

“Stockholm,” Steve finished, noticing the knife he held in his other hand.  Just then a woman with brown hair and a gray uniform entered the room.  Kayla knew what was going to happen as it was happening, but she was startled despite herself.  Like catching a rerun of I Love Lucy and still reacting to the candy conveyor speeding up like you hadn’t seen it a million times before.  “Oh, I’m sorry,” the maid said in her Nordic accent, a bit startled at their presence.  “… It’s past noon, I thought this room was cleared, that you were checked out.”

Unlike the first time, Steve wasn’t so much smart-ass as he was wanting his wife’s ass.  He felt the strain of his erection against his underwear and remembered vaguely that they had all day together in Stockholm.  All day to make love to my wife.  Steve felt his frustration over this jump melt away as happy anticipation washed over him.   

“No, ma’am, we haven’t checked out.  We’re gonna be here all day, actually.”

Steve pulled the patterned comforter over Kayla, and she scooted down a bit into the covers.

They’re too busy checking other things out, the maid figured.  Rather than voice that, she nodded her head with an embarrassed blush to her cheeks, and quickly left the way she’d come.

As soon as she was gone, Steve pulled Kayla on top of him so that she was straddling his crotch.  Her hair was tousled from sleep, and her face was free of makeup as her pale yellow nightshirt fell over her thighs.

“Whoa, cowboy!” Kayla giggled feeling his arousal pump subtly against her.  “What, did you take that with you from New Year’s Eve?”

“I think that was New Year’s Day, technically, Sweetness.  And, no, this body woke up this way.  You know what I’m like in the mornings,” he leered as he ran his hands greedily over her silk-covered breasts.  Then he corrected himself.  “Actually, this wasn’t quite morning wood, baby, he said with a kind of half-smile driven by the sudden memory of how this very moment really went the first time he lived it.  “You were sleeping in that bed over there,” he said nodding his chin to the other bed, “and I just savored every minute in the same room with you.  I watched you sleep, and I had to force myself to keep my hands off you.  Then when you jumped in my bed?  Kayla …,” he continued to plam her breasts, enjoying the feel of their smooth silk-covered softness.  “You don’t know how badly I wanted you when we were in Stockholm.  I loved you …,” he gently squeezed the breasts he was fondling.  “I wanted to touch you all the time.”  Then a little harder.  “So, when you jumped in my bed looking all scared and all first-thing-in-the-morning-like,” he gave her a naughty smirk and paused briefly before finishing his thought, “… this is what it did to my cock, baby.”

Kayla was silent hearing this revelation, which wasn’t a surprise to her but made her heart soar just the same.  She gave him a sweet, seductive smile yet felt a small blush hit her cheeks. 

“You were so damn sexy, in Stockholm, baby.  I had to force myself to keep my hands off you.”

“I wanted your hands on me,” she said in a smokey voice that dripped with sexuality.  Steve looked up at her with half-lidded intensity as he ran his hands over her shoulders and down to her bottom, holding it steady as he used upward motions to grind against her. 

“I think I detect a very horny man below me,” Kayla said seductively.

“I want you so much, baby,” he moaned as he pushed up the sheath of silk separating him from her firm breasts and kissed her hotly on the underside of one.

“Room Service!” came a yell just after yet another knock to the hotel room door.

“You’ve gotta be kidding me,” Steve hissed.

“Oh!” Kayla inhaled sharply with a grin on her face.  “I remember!  This is when we play!”  She rolled off of him and settled into the same sitting position beside him as when she’d arrived.

“Ya know what, I don’t think we’re ever gonna get to play, here.”

“Come in!” Kayla called.

“What?!”

The bellhop opened the door and started to roll in quite the silver service of breakfast.  “Don’t you remember?” Kayla asked.  “You ordered room service for us.  You were trying to show me that you cared about me.  You couldn’t say it, but you wanted to do something for me.  It was sweet.”

“Just as you ordered,” the bellhop whispered to Steve without any bother to actual secrecy.  Then he stood there rather expectantly while the young half-naked couple half layed in the bed half unsure what to do to make him go away.  “Ahem,” the man cleared his throat.

“Oh!  You tipped him last time.”

“Excuse me, ma’am?”

“Remember?” Kayla prodded ignoring the waiting bellhop.  “You set it all up and tipped him?”

“Oh yeah.”  It was kind of coming back to him, and he thought he had a good idea what kind of playing Kayla was referring to.  But if he got out of that bed it was going to be a pretty awkward moment as his penis pointed itself around.  “Why don’t you grab a few bucks out of my jeans pocket, baby,” nodding over to where his jeans were plainly folded over a chair.

“Ah, sure,” she said inviting a bit of awkward, herself as she got out of bed and dug in Steve’s jeans for cash. 

The bellhop stared appreciatively at Kayla’s legs, and Steve’s demeanor instantly changed from horny frustration to deep, emerald green danger as he leaned forward meaningfully shooting daggers to the man waiting for his tip. 

He got the message immediately and went pale before Kayla turned back around to give him the bills she’d dug out for him. 

“Come here, baby,” Steve urged as he held the covers up for her to get back in.  Then he commanded, “Go,” to the now fully intimidated bellhop, who may have invented the phrase, take the money and run.

“What was that about?” Kayla asked, referring to the less than friendly tone he had taken with the man who brought them their breakfast.

“I don’t like people ogling my wife.”

“Oh, he wasn’t ogling.”

“Yeah, baby, he was.”

“And actually … I’m a lot of years from being your wife right now.”

Steve sat up straight, grabbed her shoulders roughly, and looked her in the eye.  His erection was raging, but the words she’d just said dampened the ache in his groin and shifted it to his heart.

“Don’t you ever say that again,” he whispered hotly.  Don’t you ever say you’re not my wife.”

“Steve,” she sighed with incredulity that she had clearly hurt him.  “I only meant—“

“Shh!” he put his fingers to her lips.  “I know what you meant.  But I married you three times in this life.  As far as I’m concerned, we’ve been married since I made vows to you in the snow.  We lived that already, I don’t care what year it is right now.  Don’t. Say it. Again.”

Kayla looked deeply into his eye and felt a surge of love for him so powerful that she couldn’t process it and hiccupped a small sob.  Steve swallowed it with a kiss so tender that he practically sobbed, himself. 

Kayla sighed into his mouth as Steve’s kiss quickly deepened.  “There are so many things to right in Stockholm, Sweetness, I’m not sure what we’re supposed to do first. But if we don’t make love right now I’m going to lose it.”

Kayla wanted nothing more and expertly rubbed his penis with her strong fingers as they lay side by side on the narrow bed.  But there was something about the sexual energy here on this jump that did not feel right.  She was about to say something when Steve suddenly reached into her underwear like a plundering pirate and shoved his middle finger deeply into Kayla’s vagina.  Instantly he was rewarded with a rush of hot wetness that he wanted to lick off of her.

“Oohh … yes …,” Kayla moaned. It felt so good to have him in her this way, but those walls of uncertainty suddenly rose and made her feel even more apprehensive than she did just a second ago.  When she stopped stroking him, he moved his lips down her body in a wet trail of hot insatiability.

“Steve, I, ah … I think we should – OOH, God!”  Steve had grabbed her thighs not at all gently and licked her clitoris with the length of his velvet tongue.  Before she knew what she was doing Kayla was thrusting her hips at his face urging him to lick harder and faster.  She could feel her orgasm building and had only one thing currently on her mind. Her release in the arms of this man she loved more than she could describe.

“You, ah, what, Kayla?” he asked tauntingly into her thigh as he bit her and sucked at the flesh.  “You want me to finish what we started on New Years and make you scream?”

“Oh God, yes, Steve!  Yes!”  But with every passing flick of his tongue, and with every longing to ride the waves of pleasure she so badly wanted, something felt wrong.

“Uh!” Kayla moaned in sexual frustration as she pulled her hot center away from Steve’s mouth and sat upright.

“Where are you goin’, I was just getting busy down here, baby!”

“Steve, I think,” she panted, “that we should … should not do that here.”

His penis shrunk slightly in fear as he looked up at her from his position near the foot of the bed.  “Did I hurt you, Sweetness?”

“No!  No, it’s not that.”

“What is it then?” he asked, his green eye smoldering upon her blue ones.

“I’m not sure,” she replied pensively.  She knitted her eyebrows together and chewed at her lower lip as she lost herself in thought.

Steve inched himself back up to Kayla and sat next to her.  “Baby, I want you so bad it hurts.”  And it did.  His ballsac ached to pump its seed through his hardened cock and into her slick walls.

“I want you, too,” she said as she returned his gaze with a hot one of her own.  “So bad,” she whimpered as she took his mouth in her own and practically jumped into his lap.  Then she had a thought that made her release his mouth in a sort of epiphany.

“Steve!  We can’t make love here.  Not in Stockholm.”

“What?  Why?”

“Because,” she said, caressing his face and looking into it with a desire that she knew would not be satiated.  “We didn’t do that the first time.  And if we didn’t do it then, then I’m thinking we shouldn’t do it now, either.”

Steve exhaled an aggravated, frustrated breath and looked up at the ceiling and yelled to whomever might be out there pulling the strings, “If you wanna jump us, here, now would be good time!”

Chapter Text

Find Me
Chapter 15

The look on Kayla’s face was sheepish at best as he shouted his sexual frustration at what they both knew damn well was just your average ordinary hotel room ceiling.  She saw how much Steve wanted to consume her and felt his eye smolder upon her with an edge of annoyance when he lowered his gaze.  She wanted to make him see why she had to stop what they were doing, but her own sexual need was so fierce that she was surprised she was thinking clearly enough to explain herself at all. 

“Are you mad at me?” Kayla asked.

The look in Steve’s eye softened a bit as he mentally kicked himself.  Steve was mad, alright, but it wasn’t for the reason she was alluding to.  And mad wasn’t even the primary feeling he had at the moment.  He was horny and aggravated and confused and plenty scared of what was out there and his balls hurt.  And, yes, he was mad as hell at whatever was making all this happen to them.  But the last thing Steve wanted was for Kayla to think that not having sex with him would make him mad. 

He took his gentle hand firmly to the whole right side of her face and brushed his thumb across her swollen bottom lip.  “I would never be mad at you for that.”  He took a deep breath as he tried to stay his sexual anxiety.  “I’m not gonna tell you I’m in a good place here, baby,” he said grabbing his erection that didn’t know what to do with itself trying to force himself to soften.  “And I am mad, but not at you.” 

“I’m sorry,” she replied, lightly squeezing his thigh in an attempt to soothe him.

“Don’t be sorry,” Steve said with an edge to his voice, “and touching me like that is only gonna make me wanna go at you more, here, baby—,“ he stopped short when he felt himself get stiff in his hand again resulting from her touch.  “Dammit!”  Steve jumped out of the bed and looked back at her. 

“Steve, please don’t,” she said with the puppy dog expression that always made him do anything she wanted.  “Come back.”

“Naw, baby, I don’t think so.  These weird Dick van Dyke beds mean I can’t be in it without touching you, so you just need to give me a minute for Little Stevie to calm down, ok?”

In answer to the somewhat doubtful look on her face, Steve said, “Get that out of your head, Sweetness.  I’m not mad. I could never be mad for that.  He just wants to come out and play so bad is all,” he said with a smirk.  Kayla didn’t react to the jibe.  So he said more seriously, “Sweetness, remember what I told you when you were upset about your scar?  When I’m with you but can’t have you ... this happens,” looking down at his crotch then leering just his eye back up to meet hers.

A smile finally stretched across Kayla’s face, and she cocked her head in mock haughtiness.  Steve took another deep breath as his unhappy penis began accepting that it wasn’t getting any right now. 

“I want you just as badly as you want me, you know,” Kayla said.  It took a lot of willpower to make me stop, and now I’m feeling all dressed up with no place to go, too.”

“Dressed up, baby?” he grinned knowing exactly what she was saying.

“Mmm-hmm.”  She couldn’t stop herself.  The thought of how wet she was for him made her lose her focus just like that.  Her sultry eyes matched the smokey voice as she absently brought her own fingers to fondle her taut nipple.  “It’s going to be a shame to waste how hot and wet I am.”

Steve was on her so fast she cried out.  He crushed his mouth upon hers and invaded it with his ungentle, marauding tongue.  Kayla clung to him, sucking on his tongue with desperation and digging her fingernails into his back as her wet folds licked the thigh he shoved into her center.  You haven’t kissed these lips yet.  “Steve,” she whimpered, doubt screaming at her.  He answered her with two fingers parting the labia that were leaking her wetness down her thigh.  “Oh, God, I’m going to come, Steve.” He slid his fingers as far into her as they would go. 

“Come for me, baby!  You come for me!” 

The sensations were exquisite and euphoric.  “Oh, please!” she screamed as his fingers played with her clitoris.  You never had these fingers inside you. 

Steve ground his now throbbing, engorged cock against Kayla’s firm thigh while he fingered her with his left hand and held her head aside firmly with the other so he could bite at the skin above her collarbone.  “Sweetness you’re so beautiful,” he panted.  He tasted the skin he was biting and wanted to lap up the wetness he knew was gushing between her legs.  “And you taste … baby you taste so fucking good,” his pelvis thrusting even harder against her thigh.

Kayla’s heart raced.  This tongue never tasted you.  “Steve, I love you.” No more changes! “I want you so bad, but –“

Steve groaned at what was coming.  “Sh*t …”

“But I’m scared!”

Steve pulled his fingers out of her with a tight sucking sound, and Kayla moaned from the sudden emptiness.

“Why?!” he roared as he pushed himself to the foot of the bed needing to put the physical space between them.  “Because we didn’t do it here officially?”

“Yes!”

“But we wanted to!  Doesn’t that count?!  Kayla!  I wanted to make love to you so bad then but our heads weren’t there yet.  Now our heads are there, so why does it matter if these bodies did or didn’t or what?!”

“I can’t explain it, Steve!  I just feel like we’ve already changed something—“

“Yeah, and then we jumped FARTHER BACK!”

“—and we don’t know what that’s going to mean in the future when we get there!”

“Oh, you’ve got our jump schedule, now?  They print you an itinerary, Sweetness?” he snapped.

Hurt shown in Kayla’s eyes, especially because he used her pet name in that tone of voice.  “If you want to snap at me, Steve Johnson, you go ahead, but don’t you dare call me Sweetness when you do it!”  Steve immediately regretted the nasty comment.  “Don’t you do that!”  Tears were stinging the backs of her eyes. 

Steve sighed deeply and reached out for her hand as he looked at her with apology.  “Sweetness…,” he said tenderly.  She took his hand in acceptance, and laced her fingers tightly with his. 

“We don’t know what those changes will mean for us,” Kayla repeated softly as tears began to pool in her eyes.  “And I just think we should be careful.  We shouldn’t make any more changes or do anything really important that we didn’t do the first time. I could be wrong, maybe I’m worrying over nothing. But I just have this feeling that we’re not supposed to make love with bodies that aren’t already at that stage of our relationship.”  When she blinked, a tear fell from her glassy, red-rimmed eyes, and an unsolicited memory popped into Steve’s head. A vision of Kayla at Helga’s while he held a towel up to her.  She was beautiful, dripping wet, her hair a tangle of ringlets, and the look in her eyes hungry and terrified and a little lost.  It was only now as he saw her looking at him with those same eyes that he realized … with disdain and contempt for whomever or whatever was causing all of this … that she was right.

Their heated exchange had cooled their desire.  Still holding her hand, Steve looked at her and nodded.  “Ok, baby,” then he gathered her up in his arms.  “Ok.  You win.”  Kayla held onto him tightly for a moment, then she placed a light but loving kiss on his lips. 

“I’m going to the bathroom to clean off,” she said as she gently pulled away from Steve.

“Clean off or get off, baby?” he asked sending a thrill through both of them.

“Yes,” she grinned teasingly.

Steve looked at her like the little devil she was.  “You’re naughty, baby.”

“Have fun,” she said as she closed the door to the bathroom.

“Leave the door open!” he said seriously, all teasing gone from his voice.

Kayla opened the door back up and peered out at him.  “Ok.”

And just like that they were solemn again.  They both cleaned up and nothing more, and when Kayla emerged from the bathroom Steve took his turn to pee and get a good look at this face, the youngest one he’d jumped into so far. 

When he came back out, Kayla was in her yellow robe sitting at the table where the room service had been waiting for them.

“Well, baby, this looks like something we’ve done before.  What did I order for us, again?”

Kayla was starving and couldn’t wait when the aroma of the eggs, bacon, and coffee beckoned her.  “Your omelets are better, but this is really good,” she said.

Steve put on a pair of jeans and sat down across from her.  “Not sure when this body last ate, but I’m starving.”  Kayla chuckled at the double entendre and scooped a large serving of breakfast food onto a plate for him.  “Sweetness,” he said in a warning tone.  “Don’t you start now, baby, that’s not what I meant, and I just got him calmed down.”

Kayla put up a hand in supplication and took a sip of her coffee.

They ate in silence for a long time, both lost in their own thoughts.  Soon, Steve sensed something not right between them.  He didn’t like it.  

Kayla felt his eyes on her and looked up to meet his intense glare.

“What’s happening to us, Kayla?”

“I wish I knew,” she said.

“No.  Us.  What is happening to us?”

Her stomach turned slightly as she realized her husband’s meaning.

“Don’t disconnect.”

“I don’t mean to,” she said.

“You have to let me touch you.  Don’t shut me out.”

“You feel shut out?” she asked stunned.  Kayla let out a laugh of realization.  “You know what this is?” she asked. 

“What?”

“A role reversal.  The last time we sat in these chairs eating this room service, I was saying these same kinds of things to you.”

“Well, you always were the smart one.  Now take your own advice from the first time and stay with me, here.”

“Stay with you?  Steve, I’m not going anywhere.  You think I’ve checked out or something?”

“Kayla,” he chided a bit.  “I can feel the wall you’ve put up between us here,” he gestured to the air above the table.  “You came out of that bathroom, and suddenly I’m at arm’s length.”

“I’m sorry,” she said, frustrated. “I don’t want distance, I just want us to tread carefully, can’t you see that?”  She reached out for Steve’s hand, and he grabbed it up into his own.  “I’m just scared of what is happening to us.  We haven’t really tried to figure it out.” 

“Well, I don’t’ know how we do that, baby, I don’t see any yellow brick road to follow, here, do you?”

She got quiet, trying to find her words.  Steve kept hold of her hand, knowing she was struggling to explain it to him; he needed her to, so he remained silent, letting her find her words.  “I’m having fun, Steve.  I’m enjoying this.  These bodies, your body, being so much younger, knowing what we know now while in the past.  And I’m easily forgetting that what’s happening is … wrong.  It’s like blue food, it just doesn’t occur in nature.  Blue food is man-made. And what’s happening to us?  This time jumping … it has to be man-made, too.”

“Ever hear of a blueberry, Sweetness?”

“Yeah, mush it up and you get purple.”

“Blue corn chips.”

“Steve.”

“Blue slushies.”

“Those don’t occur in nature.”

“Taste natural to me.”

“Will you knock it off.  I’m being serious, here.”

“Baby.  What do you propose we do?  Stop living?”

“I want to stop guessing.  I want to know what is going on.”

Steve turned his head from her and worked the muscles in his jaw in exasperation. 

“Oh, now who’s turning away.”

“You think I don’t want to know?  You think I like feeling out of control?  Well, I don’t, baby.  But I won’t apologize for wanting to be with you while we’re here.  So excuse me for guessing with you as my top priority, Kayla!” 

She didn’t like Steve’s tone and now felt lost in the distance that, as Steve said, she put there.  Now he was mad at her, and all she wanted to do was break through that brand new wall and get to him.  Panic set in, and she suddenly had to be touching him or she was going to crumple.

Kayla sprung from her chair and straddled his lap facing him.  She grabbed his face with her palms and placed kisses all over his face.  It wasn’t sexual, it was emotional.  Steve wrapped his arms around his wife’s waist in relief as she kissed him, taking every kiss she gave and absorbing them into his heart.  She kissed his cheeks, his eye, the cool leather of his patch, his forehead, his chin, his nose, his lips, then she looked at him and said, “I’m just scared, that’s all.”

“Ok, Sweetness,” he embraced her and laid his head to her chest.  “Baby,” he said from the warmth of her bosom, “I don’t know if there’s someone waving his abracadabra or if it’s cosmic or what.”  He inhaled deeply and continued.  “Just don’t disconnect us.”

“I won’t.  I’m so sorry.  I won’t.”

Then he reached his mouth over and kissed her breast gently through the thickness of her robe.  “And forgive me if I can’t help it if your breasts end up in my mouth.”

Kayla giggled and said, “Ok, I’ll try to tell them to behave themselves.”  Still on his lap, she lowered her head and kissed him deeply. His penis stirred and he fought not to press on.

“Now go back over there, and finish your breakfast I worked so hard to order, here.”

While Kayla ate a piece of bacon, Steve got an idea.  “Remember Stockholm, baby?  I remember it like it was yesterday.”

She looked at him with those intense blue eyes and recalled every moment.  “I remember everything about it,” she said.

“Remember what we did at this table last time?”  He reached his hand straight across the table with his palm facing down. 

“Be careful or you’ll get burned,” she said.

Steve smiled and laughed a very Steve sounding laugh. It filled her heart and grounded her to hear it.  I want to play 20 Questions, baby.”  Kayla smiled and looked down at her plate.  “Play with me, Sweetness.”

“Ok,” she said as she licked her lips and stuck another fork of egg into her mouth.  “You go first.” 

Steve smiled.  “What’s your favorite food?” 

“You,” she said quickly.

“What kind of answer is that?”

“It’s an answer,” she said confidently.

“Ok, next time you want a hot fudge sundae, I’ll remind you that what I’ve got is all you need.”

“M’kay,” she said unfazed.” 

Ooh, his little devil was giving him a real game here.  Bring it on, baby.

“What’s your favorite fantasy,” she asked.

“I lied last time, you know.”

“So fess up, Mr. Johnson.”

“Ok, Mrs. Johnson.  You in a red dress splayed out on a pool table with your legs over my shoulders screaming my name as I fuck your brains out comes to mind.”

Kayla’s jaw dropped at the lustily explicit words coming out of her husband’s mouth, and she felt herself instantly drench in a new release of wetness.

“You asked,” he said as he took a sip of coffee like he’d just read her the latest stock prices.

Kayla composed herself and said, “the truth this time was much better than the lie last time.”  Then she smiled.  “I can’t wait to search my closets for a red dress,” she said as she very purposely licked her lips.

Steve’s cock was at full attention, but he ignored the strain against his jeans.  “My turn,” he said as he plowed his hand through his hair.  “How is it possible that you didn’t move on with anyone after I died?”

Kayla was not prepared for this question.  “I don’t want to play this anymore.”

Steve was equally unprepared for that answer.  And it bothered him.  Especially when he saw the color drain right out of her face.  “Why don’t you want to talk about that?”

“I just don’t,” she shrugged.  “It hurts to think about.”  Her eyes nervously darted around the room.

What was going on here?  Steve pressed on despite the clear signals Kayla was sending him.  “All those years, and you didn’t sleep with another single person, even though you thought I was dead?”

“I told you,” she said in a very small voice looking away from him, “there was one.  Just one person I tried with.  It didn’t work.”  He studied her face very carefully as she paused and pursed her lips together.  Her furrowed brow and evasive eyes made him uneasy.  “It was a very bad decision.  In every way.”

“Why?”

“Because I was still married to you in my heart. I took off my ring,” she said as she buried her face guiltily in her hands, “and it felt so much like cheating on you, but I really tried.” Kayla was over this mistake in her life a very long time ago, so why she was feeling the sudden and intense remorse over it now she didn’t know.  Maybe because she never told him whom it was with.  Maybe because she was too ashamed.  

Her face was heavily flushed now, and Steve was alarmed at the agitation this question had caused.  He continued to stay silent.

Kayla took a deep breath and with enormous difficulty looked him in the eye.  “I only tried because losing you made me … insane.  It was the worst kind of hurt when you died—when they took you.  Thinking I’d never feel your body on mine, see the love in your eyes, grow old with you.  The pain drove me mad.  I was so self-destructive, it just makes me feel ashamed whenever I think about it.”  Steve’s eye filled with unshed tears at the pain he saw in his wife’s face.  “Stephanie was the only thing that kept me going.  I looked at her and saw you, and one day I realized that was all I needed. You were with me.  I didn’t want anybody else.  I realized that I would be in love with only you forever and that I would never be able to move on from you, Steve.  And so I stopped trying.”

“Not so much as one more date.”  It was not a question.

“Not one.”

Steve paused for a moment letting her words sink in.  You stayed lonely, Sweetness.  For 16 years you stayed lonely.  Steve never felt more cheated out of their future than he did at that very moment.   “Ok, your turn.” 

Kayla closed her eyes and tried to tuck away the pain that his question had so quickly brought to the surface.  When she opened her eyes, he offered a sweet smile that she couldn’t help but return. 

“Ok … let me think …,” she said as she pushed back from the table and adjusted herself to a more comfortable position in her chair.  She struggled to find some question that would take them back to their lighthearted mood of a few moments ago, but despite her best efforts, there was something she had to know more.  Lighthearted, however, it was not.

“How many women were you with during your time as Nick?”

“What?” he asked as his eye looked up at hers in disbelief.  She didn’t want to know this.  Did she?  Steve stared at her for a moment hoping she’d think better of it and ask him something else.  But the seriousness on her face showed him otherwise.  He wanted to lie to her.  He mentally grabbed at something to help soften the blow, but there was nothing there but truth.  He had to answer her.

“Kayla,” he started with a heavy sigh.  “You know that was a really rough time … and I’ve told you how it was for me.  With Della … and the … others.”  He waited before he continued, searching her face for understanding.  Kayla’s expression was neutral and unwavering.  He didn’t want to tell her.  But he did.  The words burned his throat as they formed on his lips.  “Nine.  I slept with nine women during that time.  There were a few women when I was still Dimera’s soldier.”  He purposely left out Ava’s name.  A couple when I first … woke up as Nick.  And then I met Della.  And you already know we weren’t exclusive, so there were a few more.”  Then Steve’s world fell apart as he watched the pain and hurt as it etched across his wife’s face and made its way to her eyes.

He hung his head in shame as tears of anger and guilt blurred his vision.  Tell me it’s ok.  Please tell me that you understand. And that you love me anyway.  Please, baby.

Seeing her husband’s shoulders shake as he cried, Kayla bit back the hurt of his revelation and reached out for his hand. She brushed a loving thumb over his palm as she struggled to find her words.  Her voice cracked when she finally spoke them.

“I won’t lie to you and tell you that it doesn’t make me sick to my stomach to imagine you with other women, Steve,” she choked out.  “Truthfully, it breaks my heart.  But,” she stopped short as she tugged on his hand.  He slowly raised his cloudy eye to hers before she continued, “I know you didn’t choose to leave me.  And you didn’t cheat on me.” 

Steve exhaled a sob as the tears spilled down his face.

“I love you, nothing is ever going to change that.”

There’s a reason Steve chose never to think of those women. The pain of having been unfaithful to her in his own mind was too much for him.  Now that he was forced to face it and put voice to it, he wept for the guilt of his infidelity, and wept more at her absolution.

“I’m so sorry, Kayla,” he sobbed.  “I’m sorry!”

“Noooo, no, no, no, no, baby!”  Kayla jumped into his lap for the second time that morning and forced him to look at her.  He couldn’t face her.  Instead, he shrunk into her arms as she sat in his and told her he loved her over and over.  “Baby, please look at me,” she begged him.  Slowly Steve raised his face to her, and she rained more kisses down upon it.  “My turn to remind you.  This was done to you.  You weren’t unfaithful.  You weren’t!  Because you weren’t you!”

Steve slowly calmed as Kayla comforted him with the same kind of tender shushes that she used with their daughter several jumps ago.  Steve’s patch had come completely away from its normal home and rested in a tangle at his hairline.  She leaned her face down and kissed his scar and ran her hands soothingly through his hair and re-adjusted it for him.  Then Steve tipped her chin toward him and kissed her tenderly with every bit of undying love he’d ever had for her.  

“Thank you for loving me, Kayla,” he said with deep feeling.

“Thank you for coming back to me.” 

Then wiping away the last of his tears with the pads of her thumbs, Kayla whispered, “your turn.”

Steve gave her a sad smile.  “You want more after that, Sweetness?”

“I do,” she said.

Steve thought of a question immediately and hoped it would lighten things up considerably.  “If you could choose where we jump next, where would you go?  What time would you want to go back to?”

“Well, I would just check that itinerary they printed out for me,” she quipped.

Steve laughed, and it was music to Kayla’s ears.  She closed her eyes and felt his laughter in her soul.  When she opened her eyes, she knew without a doubt where she wanted to go. 

“Remember when we were on the run after you shot Harper?  I’d want to go to the honeymoon hotel with those heart-shaped beds,” she smiled.

“You know, we didn’t make love in that time, either, baby.”

“That’s not why I want to go there.”

“You sure, Sweetness?  There were bananas and bubbles and everything there.”

Kayla was still coiled up comfortably in Steve’s lap.  “You know what else was there, Steve?”  He waited patiently for her to answer him.  “Joy.  And safety.  And so much hope for what we could have.  What we would have.  Her eyes radiated the happiness that moment in time brought her.  Steve’s heart swelled with so much love.  “You just held me in that bed so tenderly until we fell asleep.  It made me so happy to be in your arms.  Even though somebody was chasing us, and I was scared, I knew in that moment laying in your arms that nothing could touch us.  Nothing could hurt us.  And I could see what our future could be.”  She looked at him watching her so intently.  “That’s where I would go,” she smiled.  Steve looked deeply into the eyes she looked up from his lap at him with.  Words were not needed.  It was a beautiful answer.  He patted the area above his heart with double taps in a heartbeat rhythm like he’d done all those years ago, and Kayla knew what she wanted to ask him next. 

“Your turn, baby,” Steve said.

“Tell me when you fell in love with me.”

Steve liked this question.  He didn’t need any convincing to think about loving her.  “Baby, I don’t know the exact moment it happened, but I can definitely tell you the exact moment I first knew. 

“Tell me,” she smiled.

“It was right here in Stockholm two days ago.  In the storm drain.”

“The storm drain …,” she whispered.

“I thought we were going to die in that storm drain, Kayla.  Right before the water stopped, I was about to tell you … that I loved you.  I didn’t know it.  But I realized it when I thought we weren’t going to make it.  And when you came up out of there, that’s the moment I felt how much I loved you for the first time.  That I was truly in love with you.  I knew it as I walked us back to Helga’s.”

“You’ve never held me tighter than on that walk. I’ll never forget it”

“I was scared out of my head of these feelings, Sweetness, but I couldn’t help myself.  What I was feeling for you there overwhelmed me.  I had never felt that before for anyone.”

“Not even Britta?”  Why did I just say that?

Steve bored a hole through her with his eye.  “Not about anyone, Kayla.  It was unbelievable to know what that kind of love was.  And it was with you.  And you almost died.  I had never been so scared of anything.”  He paused for a moment then continued.  “Then when you had that dress on, and your hair was off your neck, baby … I just wanted to carry you in my arms all the way back to this hotel room and make love to you forever.  I wanted to love every part of you.”

“Steve …,” Kayla breathed his name with such feeling. 

Steve couldn’t help himself, his groin stirred with instinctive, longing need to consume her.  He lowered his lips to her with a warm kiss filled with his love, then deepened it right away.  Kayla moved to straddle him and wrapped her arms around his neck as her belly tingled with desire.  Steve slipped his warm hand into her robe and under the nightshirt till he was firmly palming her breast. Her nipple peaked to a beaded pearl as he kneaded it, and Kayla moaned in pleasure.  Even as their tongues dueled, they both knew this was a bad idea.  But they couldn’t help themselves.  “Baby,” Steve pleaded.  Then he roughly pumped himself up at her while she started humping against him in equal measure.

“I’ve got to come, Kayla.  What are we gonna do?” he panted.

“I don’t know … ah … maybe we …”

“Up.”  He knew what they had to do.  “You have to get up,” he moaned before clasping his hands to her head and angling it to his lips for a final hot kiss. Then he physically lifted her up by her sides.  While his intention was to push her off of him, instead he tore at her robe, reached into her nightshirt, and brought her breast into his mouth.  He sucked hard and bit at her nipple, making her whimper his name. 

Kayla held his head to her breast and then stood up on shaky legs at the same time that Steve gave her a little push toward her chair. 

“You’re killin’ me, baby.  You’re killin’ me.”

“We need a break or I’m going to pass out, Steve.”

“Me first,” he said.

“I’m, ah, I’m going take a shower.”

“That’s a good idea, Sweetness, you go do that, I’ll stay here.”

“With the door open,”

“Right.  Ah … what are you going to do?”

“I’m going to stay here and get myself off.”

“Oh,” she said ironically, “that’ll make me less horny for sure.”

“I’m sorry, baby, but I’m in pain, here.”

“No,” she smiled, “you do what you’ve got to do.  But I’m not watching this time.”  Kayla saw that there weren’t any clean towels.  “Steve, can you see if the maid cart is out there, I need a towel.”

“Yeah,” he called.  Steve opened the door and saw the cart two rooms down.  He sprinted down with his erection rubbing painfully against his jeans and grabbed an armful of towels.  As he turned back around, he felt the tug.  Panic rose in him as he realized that Kayla was all the way in their room.  Without a second thought, he dropped the towels and ran back toward her.

Back in the bathroom Kayla felt the jump effect begin and snapped her head around hoping to God Steve was there.  He wasn’t.   “Steve!” she screamed at the top of her lungs. 

“Kayla!” he shouted back as he burst through the doorway.  She ran into his arms. 

In the next instant, Steve was surrounded by voices, music, and just plain noise.  He was so dizzy that he knew he was going to vomit.  It took everything he could muster to keep it together as he reached for her.  This time he came up with nothing but the cold air he was standing in.  He whipped his head around looking for her, and an unbridled cold panic set in when he realized she wasn’t there.

Kayla left her raging horny body in Stockholm, and the next thing she was aware of was a nasal female voice having just asked her a question.  “Ste—“ she tried to call for him, but she had to swallow hard instead.

“Mrs. Deveraux, do you think your husband’s going to win?”

“Who?” Kayla asked as she felt the cold and saw the people and had a sick, disgusting feeling about where she’d jumped to.

“Oh,” Angelica laughed snootily.  “I guess you’re the Mrs. Deveraux she’s referring to.”

“Angelica?” Kayla asked in astonishment.

“Um, nooooo,” Angelica answered like Kayla was a first-grader.  “That would be you, Kayla, dear.”

Kayla darted her eyes around the pier, struggling to remember exactly what day this was and wasn’t Steve here and where was he and oh my God, what’s happening?!  In every other jump, Steve was beside her when they arrived. This time, she didn’t see him anywhere.

Chapter Text

Find Me
Chapter 16

Kayla was completely surrounded by people, some she once knew, some she still knew, but mostly complete strangers.  All eyes seemed to be on her, especially those of her former mother-in-law, who was looking at her expectantly with the perfect political smile on her face.  The one person she needed to see that appeared to be missing was Steve.  He didn’t jump with me. Why didn’t he jump with me?! Kayla thought with a terrible sense of dread, which left the reporter’s question hanging in the air awkwardly.

Angelica went into political smooth-overy mode the second the reporter’s building confusion became apparent.  “I’m afraid between the excitement and this hat, Kayla just can’t find the words,” she laughed with just the slightest bit of condescension.  “Of course Kayla thinks her husband is going to win, don’t you, Kayla?”

Husband.  It’s the night of the election.  “I, um …”  Angelica’s face was clear: say the right thing right now. “Yes, he’s definitely going to win.”

“Well,” the reporter replied with a bit of relief in her enthusiastic voice, “you sound like there’s never been any doubt in your mind.”

That’s when Kayla’s searching eyes found him standing across the pier.  Steve stood on the steps with a desperate look in the eye that was willing her to see him.

“Nope,” Kayla said as a beautiful smile spread across her face as she stared at the man whose own face registered cautious relief.  “I can pretty much promise you that he will, actually.”

The eager little reporter jotted furiously in her notebook as Jack came toward her and Angelica beaming with pride, not a shred of evidence on his face that her absence on New Year’s Eve even happened.  Kayla glanced up at Steve for only a brief moment, but that’s all it took to catch that he wasn’t right.  The look on his face was questioning with a hint of doubt.  Just then Kayla’s stomach lurched as a very healthy and smug-looking Darrel Canby walked right up to Jack. 

“Mr. Deveraux can I have a word with you?” The Spectator reporter asked.

Before she could react with the alarm that was coursing through her, Angelica shooed the two of them away so her stepson could give the press the time they needed. 

“Look, I'll answer any of your questions tonight down at Blondies,” Jack replied as Kayla looked back at them.  Before the political supporters swarmed passed them obscuring her view, Kayla caught a flash of the green envelope containing the photos that sealed her fate all those years ago. 

“What … how did—" Kayla said aloud.

“Fine, Kayla, you did fine,” Angelica answered.  “You’ve got to be quicker, though, these reporters will jump on anything that signals weakness to them, so you are going to have to work on those ‘ums’ and ‘ahs’ right away.”

“Right,” Kayla said absently as she looked back to Steve not knowing what to do about Canby and his fateful green envelope. 

She couldn’t help but feel Steve’s eye drilling a hole into her.  He mouthed something very subtly, but she caught it: “That you?” 

Her heart jumped into her throat as she put her hand to her chest with enormous relief.  She nodded slightly with a smile that Angelica took as her response to just having been introduced to one of Jack’s campaign contributors. 

With her confirmation that she was his Kayla, Steve blew out the breath he was holding with a grunt.  He’d been looking upon her being led about the pier by Angelica with barely restrained angst.  When he’d arrived and she wasn’t there, he almost screamed her name. But he immediately heard and saw the throngs of people and realized he’d jumped into the middle of a crowd.  At first he couldn’t figure out when this was, but when he heard a shrill voice carry across the cold night air that said “Deveraux,” he looked harder at his surroundings.  Campaign signs.  The riverfront polling place.  Then he saw Jack and that stupid hat Angelica was wearing and knew this was election night.  It only took a moment after that to find Kayla next to her.  What was she doing all the way over there?  They’d never been separated by any kind of distance on their other jumps.  He had to get to her. 

He had been watching as she’d searched the pier for him; it seemed to take forever before he caught her eye.  When he finally did, it was like the weight of the world had been lifted from his shoulders. She saw him. She knew him.  Which she is it?  The thought came to him unbidden.  He had no reason to believe that wasn’t his Kayla in there, but he also remembered Election Day Kayla looking at him with that exact same face, just as eager to get to him as this one was.  He had to know this was her. He had to know his wife was really with him. 

He mouthed the question to her, and he was positive she nodded, but it wasn’t quite enough, he had to make contact with her.  Before he could make a move toward her while she was being forced to press the flesh by that red bitch of a mother-in-law of hers he spotted something that made him stop dead in his tracks.  Canby was talking to Jack.  He couldn’t hear what they were saying, but there was no doubt in his mind that he was witnessing in this moment what had happened right under his nose the first time.  Canby was giving Jack the pictures of he and Kayla; the pictures that drove Jack to eventually rape her.  And Canby was none the worse for wear.  He could see him clearly. No split lip, no bruises, no evidence that Steve had threatened him against this very action at all. 

“We didn’t change anything,” Steve said to himself.  “It’s like it never happened.”

The reporter walked away from Jack looking nothing but full of himself.  Again, Steve started down the stairs to stop him from opening the envelope he’d just started to unfasten, but just then his father, the Senator, approached him. 

“Jack, what are you doing standing here by yourself?” Harper Deveraux boomed proudly to his son.  “The polls are closed now, the verdict is in!”

He wanted to warn Kayla, but there was no good way to get to her, people were all around her.  Look at me, baby. 

Just then Angelica walked off and Kayla turned her head to find Steve again.  The blonde reporter was back saying something to Jack, and it was all Kayla could do to stay where she was “supposed” to be.  Not only was she trying to appear like everything was normal as Jack’s wife, but she was doing it as having jumped into this body with her 2009 awareness, making it that much harder.  This was 21 years ago, and she was struggling to remember the big things, like if Harper had already killed his first prostitute yet, let alone the little things, like who these people were that were talking to her on the pier.  To say nothing of the fact that Harper, the complete psychopath bent on killing her and very nearly doing it, was standing not two feet from her.  It was completely unnerving. 

The searching look on Kayla’s face was killing Steve.  Please come get me, her eyes pleaded to him.  Get me out of this, they begged him.  But Steve was utterly baffled.  He wanted nothing more than to go to her and drag her away whether people were watching or not. But the sight of Darrel Canby looking all arrogant with that self-serving smile on his face, and Jack holding those pictures, made him wonder what the hell had gone on with their bodies in the short weeks they’d last been in them.  Canby was out there walking around, even made full-on eye contact with him at one point, and the man didn’t bat an eye.  Not a single feather was ruffled.  And he had the audacity to give Jack the photos!  Steve was positive the photos were in there, of that he had no doubt.  But what alarmed him most was the fact that the reporter’s lip was completely intact.  Steve knew that he busted that lip so wide open that it was going to take a lot of stitches to put it back together. There’s no way that lip would have looked so perfect in that amount of time, even with 2009 medicine, let alone that of 1988. 

Steve tried to send his thoughts into Kayla’s head through sheer force of will, but he didn’t even know what his thoughts were right now.  Meanwhile, Kayla was just looking for some way to get off that pier.

“And hopefully all these willful people have voted for me!” Jack bellowed to his cheering supporters, bringing Kayla out of her head.

Then something amazing happened.  Jack stepped away and accidentally dropped the green envelope.  Kayla’s eyes became as big as saucers.  She paused for only a moment to let the joy of her dumb luck sink in before she very calmly and methodically bent down, retrieved the hateful green package, and tucked it inside her coat.  When she next turned around, she found Steve’s gaze looking at her like she was the most brilliant woman on the face of the planet.

That’s my girl, Sweetness, Steve beamed at her.  You always were the smart one, baby!  Kayla crossed her arms in a hug across her chest back at Steve in a furtive reply.  The sign for love.

Things were moving so quickly on that pier that she didn’t have time to react any further as a campaign worker announced the news that Jack was the winner.  Jack threw his arms around Kayla, and she tensed at his touch.  The Jack she knew today was a man she’d grown to forgive (if not forget), care about as her brother-in-law, and be forever indebted to for bringing her husband home. But this Jack was a man who would be attacking her in just a few short hours, and her body couldn’t help but react to it.  She was also trying to keep a very good hold of the photos under her arm inside her coat. 

Jack felt Kayla tense up, but it’s not like it was anything new for him.  She looked so beautiful in the light of the pier’s streetlamps and he just wanted to take her home to the loft and make love to her.  “I wanted to be sure to thank my biggest supporter,” he said to her.

Kayla forced herself to look at him and not Steve, who himself was watching their every move.  She saw the hungry look in Jack’s eyes and felt sick to her stomach.  “You’re going to do great, Jack,” she said with the faintest hint of sadness to her voice, which he chose to ignore in utter denial.

“Especially with you by my side,” he smiled back at her.

“My stepson the assemblyman!  Honey, I'm so proud of you!”  Angelica practically mowed Kayla down to throw her arms around Jack in exhilaration. 

This commotion was registering as very familiar to Steve.  He was nearly sure this was the best opportunity he was going to have to spirit Kayla away.  He didn’t really need to catch her gaze, as it had been almost entirely on him throughout this absolutely insane jump.  He motioned for her to step away and follow him, and Kayla was chomping at the bit to do so.

“Jack, if you don't mind, I’d like to get to Shenanigans and take care of some last-minute things before your victory party,” Kayla said.

“Honey, don’t you mean Blondie’s?”

Kayla blanched realizing that these details were going to betray her.  “I, ah … I meant, I left my car at Blondie’s—SHENANIGANS—and I just want to pick it up so I can get to Blondie’s,” she offered feebly.

“That’s a great idea, honey, I’ll see you there!” Jack said. Then he did something that made Steve jump out of his skin.  Jack took Kayla in his arms and kissed her.  He dipped her and insistently pressed his firm lips against her unwilling ones with an uninvited cold wetness.  Kayla froze in his arms keeping a death grip on the pictures hidden under the wing of her arm as he prolonged the kiss she wasn’t responding to.  But after a few seconds that seemed like an eternity, Kayla grabbed onto Jack’s shoulder with her free hand to prevent herself from falling out of his grasp, which Jack took as a sign to really go for it.  Steve watched with a green eye that flamed even greener as his brother shoved his tongue into Kayla’s mouth insisting she open to him.  Jack’s intent was unrelenting, and Kayla involuntarily opened her mouth to him and felt his tongue slather along hers like an invader.  It was the last thing she wanted, and what made it worse was the fact that she knew Steve was watching. 

Finally, Jack lifted her back up and disengaged his unsolicited mouth from hers, then yelled to the crowd, “You’re an assemblyman’s wife now!”  The crowd cheered and cat-called, and the applause rang out from the entire pier. 

Kayla couldn’t help the look of revulsion on her face as she wiped her mouth and said, “that didn’t happen last time.”

The meaning of her words sailed right over Jack’s head.  “Don’t be mad, Kayla, I promise not to show too much PDA in the future, I just had to kiss you, I’m so happy,” he grinned like a fool.  “Plus, it’s going to be a great picture for the papers tomorrow!”

Kayla knew with certainty, now, that her changed actions on the night of New Year’s Even had little or no effect.  What’s the point of keeping up this charade? she asked herself.  She wanted to just turn around and leave, who cares who sees?  It, apparently, doesn’t matter at all.  But, on the other hand,  she couldn’t help wondering how long this jump was going to last and felt that she was treading on thin ice, here.  So, she found it somewhere within herself to give him a small smile. 

“Senator Deveraux!” the nasal reporter called, “what will your son's victory mean to your campaign?”

“See you at Blondie’s, honey,” Jack said to her before focusing his full attention on his father and the press.  Kayla smiled a soft, “ok” back to him. 

She then looked up to finally follow Steve up the stairs and out of this hell they’d jumped into and saw that he was almost out of his mind.  She knew that look in his eye, and the intense jealousy made her thrill to her very core at the same time that it made her fear for the actions he might take.  The last thing Kayla heard as she made her way as calmly as possible from the festivities to wherever Steve was leading them was Harper talking to reporters. The sound of his voice made her shudder.

Steve fought the urge to run as he kept an equal eye on Kayla following behind him as he did on the pier’s path in front of him.  Anger thrummed through him as every nerve was on fire with jealousy.  Twenty-one years ago he would have swallowed that painful pill with the understanding that she was, technically, Jack’s wife.  But today that pill was so bitter he could barely stand it.  That man was kissing Steve’s wife, and he just couldn’t take it.

Steve finally stopped at the lower end of a dock two piers down, and Kayla nearly jumped into his arms with a cry she could barely contain. 

“Steve!”  She threw her arms around his neck.  “Steve, what’s happening?!”

He pulled her away and looked her in the eye.  “Kayla?” he demanded with his piercing green eye.

Kayla had a sudden surge of doubt – that maybe this wasn’t her Steve.  But … it had to be, didn’t it?  “Steve,” she pleaded desperately, “r-r-remember Stockholm?  Do you remember when we were just there?”

A slow and knowing look settled on his face.  “What is this, 20 Questions,” he asked as his voice broke with an onslaught of emotion.

“Steve,” she cried into his jacket.  “Oh, thank God, I was terrified for a second that maybe it wasn’t you!”

“Sorry I never got you those towels, baby,” he said as a tear rolled down his face.

“I was so scared.  What happened?  Why weren’t you with me this time?”

“I was, Sweetness, we just jumped into a crowd is all.”

“I couldn’t find you!” Kayla’s head was still buried in his jacket, as her tears fell upon the cold leather.

“Oh, baby,” he sighed as he brought his hand to her head.  “Ya know, I panicked,” then he placed a kiss on her temple. “I didn’t know if I had you or the 1988 you.”

“Well, we’re together, now,” she said.  Then she looked around and pulled the green folder from under her coat.  “And look what I got.”

“I know,” he said, a mixture of pride and terror in his voice.  “I saw you pick those up like it was some business report, baby.  You did so good.”

“But did you see him, Steve?  Canby?  Not a mark on him.  And he brushed right up against me like New Year’s Eve never happened!”

“Oh, I saw him, baby.  And he saw me.  He didn’t react to me at all.”  Steve inhaled deeply.  “New Year’s Eve definitely happened, Kayla, it just happened the way it did the first time, with him snapping those pictures of us with us none the wiser.”

“How’s that possible, I watched you beat him up!”

“I don’t know, Kayla, I don’t have any answers!” he raised his voice.

“Shhhh!”

“I don’t know,” he repeated in a softer voice.  “I don’t know why, but we didn’t change the future. It just went back to the regular time. Or something. I don’t know!” he boomed again.

Kayla put a gloved and calming hand to his face.  “Well, I’ve got them now, so he won’t get his hands on them on this jump, either.”

“His hands,” Steve hissed.  “They sure were all over you.  Stuck his goddamn tongue right down your throat.”

Then he grabbed Kayla’s face in his hands and smoothed over her lips with his thumbs.  His touch was so gentle, so full of love and dedication to her.  Unlike Jack’s touch both 21 years prior and just minutes ago.   He brought her face to his and replaced the feeling of Jack’s mouth on hers with his own.  He kissed her gently, lovingly, and cried into this kiss, “You’re mine, Kayla.  I don’t care when we are.”

“I’m yours,” she said back.  “No one else’s.” 

Then he pulled back again and grabbed her left hand.  Damn thing is back.  For the second time, he unscrewed Jack’s wedding ring from her finger and went to toss it into the river.

“Wait!” Kayla grabbed his hand.

“I don’t want you wearing this thing, Kayla,” he said in a warning tone.

“Good, that makes two of us,” she said, as she took the ring from his hand and threw it into the river herself.  Steve smiled down at her and placed another kiss on her lips.  “What do we do now, go to Blondie’s?”

Steve thought for a moment and tried to be rational.  But all he could come up with was to run and hide.  “I don’t think it matters what we do, baby, because the whole thing just reset the last time. This is the first time we’ve jumped somewhere that should have been different.”

“Why, Steve,” she said suddenly angry.  “Why the hell are we jumping anywhere?!”  I want answers, don’t you?  What is causing this?!

“Kayla, don’t start that, again, now.  We both want answers, but unless you know where to start looking, I think our first priority has to be living in what we’ve got to work with.”

“Well, I’m not going back to that loft with him tonight!  Tonight’s the night he … he …”

“He’s not!” Steve said grabbing her by the shoulders.  “’Cause he doesn’t have those pictures to set him off anymore.  And ‘cause you’re just not going back there, anyway.  You’re going to be with me, Sweetness.  You got that?  You’re with me.  No matter what,” he said with a shake.

Kayla reached up and gently felt the fabric at her right shoulder.  Then she looked at Steve and blurted, “I hate this dress.”

“I know,” he said meaningfully.  “You’ve got a right.”  Steve pulled her into a tight embrace and settled on what to do.  “We’re running to the loft, packing some things, and then dropping them at my place.  Then we’re going to Blondie’s.”

“No!  I don’t want to see anyone, there’s too much to remember!  Plus, Harper is there, and he’s just giving me the creeps.”

“Baby, this seems like the right way.  We did it all wrong the first time, now the election is over, you don’t go home with him. You give it a clean break at the party, and that’s that.  Then you come home with me to my apartment,” he kissed her cheek.  “My bed,” he kissed her other cheek.  “We burn those photos,” he kissed her lips.  “And if we wake up here tomorrow, we get in the car and we drive.”

“Where?  Where would we go?”

“How about, the uh, cabin, the one in the snow.  We said our vows there. We can go there.”

Kayla was quiet. 

“What?  What is it, baby, you don’t want to go there?”

“I … don’t know what I want.  I’m having a hard time getting my head into 1988 with all these people.”

“I know Jack is hard to take—“

“It’s Harper that’s worse.”

“Well, that’s why we need a clean break, Sweetness, tonight.  Just get it done and get to my place and be together to wait this thing out.”

“Until the next jump.”

Steve took a deep breath and let it out heavily.  “Until the next jump.”

Kayla wasn’t sure what to do, but when she looked up into her husband’s green eye she saw one solid truth there.  He was devoted to her.  And that’s when she resigned herself to the fact that this was happening to them.  It wasn’t a dream, it wasn’t a movie, it was happening, and to figure out who and why and how was probably pointless.  She decided then and there that however long this jump lasted, they had to just live the lives of the bodies they jumped into in the best way they could.  The wrong choices they made they’d right. The right ones they made they’d try to repeat. 

“Can I have my ring?  I don’t feel right without it.”

Steve smiled at her.  “Of course, you can,” he said.  He dug into his jacket and pulled out the ring that, once again, hung on the end of the chain around his neck.  He kissed the stone that Kayla would wear for the next 21 years (I took off your ring – he shook the confession away), undid the clasp, and placed it perfectly on the finger he’d just relieved of Jack’s ring.  “I do,” he said again to her with a smile.

“I do,” she said back and kissed him.  It was the second time they’d gone through this, and she had a feeling it wouldn’t be the last.  “I really do,” she whispered, flexing her fingers before caressing his cheek. 

Steve kissed her gingerly. “I love you so much, Sweetness.” 

“I love you more.”

“Oh, I doubt that, Mrs. Johnson,” he said.

“Let’s go get my things.  I’m going to be missed at Blondie’s soon.”

With that, they headed for Kayla’s car hand in hand, not bothering to hide themselves nor sure how long they were going to be there. 

Chapter Text

Find Me
Chapter 17

Kayla stood in the middle of the bedroom she shared with Steve.  Only she wasn’t sharing it with him yet; today she was still tiptoeing around Jack in this room.  But she loved it here, even with Jack’s things laying around.  It was still a place that made her feel a familiar comfort, even all this time later.

That comfort made it a good place to touch down and take stock.  She had been quiet in the car as she watched the Salem of her young adulthood roll past.  Shops, restaurants, her old grade school. They were all there, and the craving to walk into them and run her hands over the walls was strong.  But she resisted and stayed focused.  Now as Steve watched her glance longingly at the stairs that led up to the roof, he saw that her demeanor had turned downright serious.  They hadn’t left each other’s side since they met up on the pier, but Steve could feel her hanging on to him both literally and figuratively.  She opened a drawer on her dresser and stared into it.

“Sweetness.”

Kayla startled.  “What’s wrong?”

Steve grinned.  “Besides the obvious?”  Kayla gave him a little smirk and absently closed the drawer then opened another one.  “Nothing’s wrong with me, Kayla, but there’s definitely something going on with you.”  She didn’t hear him; his words just seemed to fall over her like a faint mist.  “Kayla?” he prodded more firmly.

“Yeah?” she looked up at him.

“You’re not hearing me at all, baby.  What’s wrong?”

Kayla had been relieved to get away from the celebration on the pier and into Steve’s arms.  She had thought the plan was a good one and just wanted to get it all over with.  But somewhere along the way she started second guessing it.  Was this really the best idea to tell Jack at the victory party?  They both knew the kind of man Jack was going to be in the years to come, and that was the good kind, the caring kind, the kind that they would both be forgiving in their own way.  So, somewhere in her, she wasn’t really interested in destroying him publicly.  But, then the feel of this Jack’s unwanted kiss on her lips made her remember other unwanted things, which reminded her that he wasn’t that Jack yet.  She wanted to make the right choice. The question in her mind was not whether or not to tell him tonight, but whether they should do it at the victory party.

“I … I don’t remember where my luggage is.”

“Luggage?  Baby, where do you think we’re going, China?”  That made Kayla smile, which was encouraging.  “Well, not yet,” he said with a smile that lightened her mood slightly.

“I mean, I don’t remember where I used to keep my bags.  I have to hurry if we’re going to make it to Blondie’s without raising suspicion.”

“There are duffels under the guest room bed,” Steve said.

Kayla looked at him with a sideways glance.  “Really?  You remember?  You’re not even living here yet.”

“For part of me, it’s not really that long ago, remember?”  Then he sighed, not sure if he should say the rest, but Kayla gave him a prodding look.  She knew her husband so well.  Steve shrugged and said, “I also saw them when I ransacked that room the other day looking for … “

“Joe,” Kayla finished, barely a whisper.

Steve nodded.  “Looking for Joe.”

Kayla walked into Steve’s arms on the small stairwell and embraced him.  She kissed the top of his head as he circled one arm around her waist while the other one reached up to grasp her shoulder.  They didn’t say anything, just shared the moment missing their son.

After going down to retrieve a small duffel, Kayla went to work filling it with basics and toiletries.  Steve could see the gears turning in her head, trying to suss out whatever was in there. 

“Baby, whatever’s goin’ on in that head of yours, it’s not just about where the bags are.  Come on, now, out with it.”

It wasn’t that she didn’t want to tell him, she just didn’t have it all sorted out, herself.  “Don’t get mad at me, ok?”  Steve shot her a look, and she nervously licked her lips.  “I don’t think we should tell Jack at the victory party,” she blurted.  “I think we should wait till after.”

“What?!”  He couldn’t keep the irritation from his voice.  “Why, Kayla?”

She zipped up the bag and sat heavily on the bed.  “Because it’ll destroy him.  And is that really the most appropriate place to do this?  In public and everything?”

Steve couldn’t believe what he was hearing.  “I don’t think he’s caring much about ‘appropriate,’ do you?”

“So, what, we’re going to march in there together and tell him ‘Hey, I don’t really love you, and now that you’ve won I’m going back to Steve, so good luck?’  You said, yourself, he doesn’t have the pictures in this time, so there’s no threat to me now.”

The very first thing he’d done when they entered the loft was burn every last photo and the envelope in the kitchen sink.  But that didn’t mean there weren’t more where that came from. Without the terrified Canby they’d been counting on, there was no reason to believe that he didn’t have more where those came from.

“No threat?  You sure about that?” he asked.  “’Cause I think you’re way off if you think there aren’t any more photos in that reporter’s back pocket.”

“Well, if they exist, they’re not going to be seen at the victory party.  Last time he’d seen them by now, and nothing happened at the party, it all happened … back here.”

“Kayla.”

“And we’re not going to end up back here, so it doesn’t matter, anyway!  We just wait to tell him at the end of the party.”

“Oh is that what we do?  We just tell him at the end of the party?”

“Yes,” she replied defensively, not appreciating Steve’s mocking tone.

Steve plowed his hand through his hair and stood up fast.  “Dammit, Kayla!  What do we do, play our roles then?  You’re the loving wife, I’m the big riverfront supporter?  Been there, done that, finished!”

“It won’t be for long, Steve.”  Kayla was getting irritated, herself.

“But it’ll be long enough for him to stick more of his tongue in your mouth!”

Kayla paused for a beat to take that in.  “Is that what this is about,” she asked with big, angry eyes, “you’re jealous?”

“No, I’m worried, don’t you get it?”  He sat down opposite her, held both her hands in his, and gentled his tone.  “If we don’t tell him at the party there’s no way we’re not going to be separated.  How do I stay by your side?  I don’t want to risk jumping while we’re apart.  Do you know how panicked I was when I got here and couldn’t find you?  If we go to that party pretending to be our 1988 selves, then what the hell kind of excuse will we have to be with each other?” He was right.  Kayla knew he was right.  “And yeah, I don’t want him touching you, ok?”

Kayla squeezed his hands.  “I don’t either.”

“Hell, I wasn’t even invited.”

“Oh yes you were,” she interjected.

“No, baby.  I was invited the first time, not this time.”

“Oh, that’s right.”  It was all so confusing in her head, she was having a hard time separating the first round’s events with the ones of today.  She looked over at him from behind her duffel and tried to find a scenario that would be believable.  “Couldn’t you just show up?  You usually did anyway.”

Steve smiled, and Kayla smiled, too.  “Yeah, he said more calmly, I turned up a lot in those days.  Checking on you.”

Kayla nodded.  “I know,” she said, smiling at the memory of how being in his presence during that time was always the thrill she rolled out of bed for every day.  Maybe he’ll come by today, she’d wish.

“So, just show up, it won’t be out of the ordinary because you were campaigning for him this whole time.  You can come in right after I do, and then you’ll have me to watch over all night.”

Steve still didn’t like it.  Plus he figured Jo and other people in their lives would be there that he didn’t want to have to be “on” for.  Despite his memory being unnaturally fresher than Kayla’s, not everything came easily to him.  The whole thing just seemed pointless to him.  Eventually they were going to jump.  Maybe in five minutes, maybe in five hours, maybe in five weeks, there was no telling.  And when they did every indication was that everything was going to reset, that their actions today wouldn’t impact a thing once they jumped away.  So, if they could push Harper into a speeding train and it wouldn’t stick, then there was no logic in playing this out for Steve.  He worked the muscles in his jaw and turned his face away in frustration.

Kayla palmed his face back to face hers.  “What if we’re here a long time, Steve?  What if we have to live in these bodies for more than a few hours?”

“But, Sweetness, what we do here won’t matter to these bodies once we jump away.”

“But it’ll matter while we’re living in them.  And if it’s a long time, then I want to make things easy on us, too.”

Steve looked at his wife for a minute and admired her hair, done beautifully in twists on either side of her head.  Her face was so beautiful, lightly made up, and she smelled so good.  “Fine,” he said.  “But I don’t like it, and if I think that things are getting out of hand, then I’m telling him on the spot, I don’t care where he is or who’s listening.”

“Ok,” Kayla agreed.

“And you are to get a headache ten minutes after you arrive so that you can get the hell out of there.”

Now Kayla smiled.  It was so simple, why didn’t she think of that?  “Even better,” she beamed.

“Then we’ll come back to the loft to tell him, then head …” Steve wasn’t sure what to call it.  “… home.  To my place.” 

In answer, Kayla kissed this man that she loved so much.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                  

Suddenly, she remembered her ring and knew they had a problem.  “Steve!” she pulled away from his lips with a smack.

“What?”

She held up the back of her left hand and cocked her head questioningly.

“Sh*t.”

“Yeah,” Kayla said.  “Now what?”

“Well, if we just tell him at the party it won’t matter,” he tried one more time.

“No,” Kayla said firmly, “you want to do things the right way this time, that’s not the right way.”

“Then baby, you’re gonna have to take it off again.”

Kayla exhaled heavily and fell back onto the bed in a heap.  “Why did I throw it in the river?  I had plenty of room in my coat for it.  I wasn’t thinking.”

Steve couldn’t help himself, he lowered his body on top of hers and kissed her neck.  “You were thinking that you were wearing the wrong ring, Sweetness.”  He cupped her breast with his hand and rubbed himself against her gently while dragging his kisses up to her ear.  “You were thinking that this was the worst night of your life and that you wanted to right it,” he said as he lowered his soft, warm lips to hers, urging her tongue to taste his.  “You were thinking that you want to make love to me right now in this bed.  The bed that should have been ours all along.”

Steve’s seduction was intoxicating, and all Kayla wanted to do was get all their clothes off and feel him inside of her, filling her with his presence, possessing her.  But time was getting away from them, and she knew that if they didn’t show up at Blondie’s very soon that here in the days before cell phones Jack was going to come looking for her.

Steve felt her thoughts tense her body and raised his head to look into her eyes.  He sighed deeply.

“You do want me, Kayla, don’t you?”

“You know I do,” she said as Steve reached down to tuck a stray hair back into its twist.  “But if we do this, I am sure Jack will walk in on us.  I don’t want that.  For a lot of reasons.”

Steve understood and didn’t disagree. He looked gently down at his wife.  He wasn’t lustful or at the brink of sexual insanity, he just wanted to be joined with his wife.  He wanted to make love to her, feel himself pour his love into her, and feel her love him back.

“I want to be with you so bad,” Sweetness.  I just need to feel you around me.  I need you so much.”

“Me, too.  I love you.”

She kissed him lovingly, then pulled the ring off her finger and gave it to him.  She watched through unshed tears as he put it back on the chain around his neck and said, “I want it back the minute we leave Blondie’s.”

Steve nodded and gave her a sad smile.

Kayla changed out of the blue dress that she’d come to hate and felt instantly better.  They held hands in the car for the short trip it took to get back to Steve’s place to drop her things, then in no time flat they were at Blondie’s.  They decided to play their roles only so far and that having her walk in before him was risky, so they walked in together, appearances be damned. 

The music was so loud when they entered the restaurant that Kayla wasn’t going to have to work too hard on generating that headache.  They stopped dead in their tracks when the first people they saw were Jo and Marcus laughing joyfully over drinks.  The sight of his old friend who’d died suddenly of a congenital heart defect while Steve was still missing took Steve’s breath away.  He reached out for Kayla’s shoulder just as Angelica came over with an irritated look on her face.  

“Kayla, darling, people have been asking for you.”

“Really,” she said while looking directly at Marcus, who hadn’t spotted them yet.  “I’m sorry, I had a little car trouble.”

“Well, in the future, I suggest you come to political events in the same car as your husband and not in your own car.  That’s what we have drivers for.”  When Kayla didn’t respond she looked over at Steve gawking at his mother.  “Mr. Johnson,” Angelica said with her nose in the air, “you’re here why?”

Steve ignored her and walked slowly to Marcus.  Kayla instinctively followed, and Angelica’s focus shifted to a supporter who’d caught her eye.  Marcus and Jo looked up from their boisterous conversation as Steve headed toward them.  “Steve!  Hey, they’ll let anybody in here, won’t they!” he said as he put a brotherly arm around Steve.

“Hey Homey,” Steve replied a little too quietly.  He didn’t sound like himself.

“Steve?”  Concern hit him immediately.  “What is it, man?”

“Are you alright, son?” asked Jo.

Steve looked at his mother and said, “Hey Jo,” giving her a smile.

Then he stood back from Marcus and gave him a hard look.  His eyes welled up, can’t you control yourself, dude, what the hell is this leaping doin’ to your self-control, man?! and he embraced his best and oldest friend in a hug that he knew would make them question what the hell was going on, but he didn’t care.  He hadn’t seen Marcus in two decades, and he never would again.  He didn’t know if he’d be jumping anywhere that Marcus might be after this, so he had to take this chance that this jump was giving him. 

“Steve, man, what’s wrong with you?  Is it Kayla?”

Kayla!

“I’m fine,” she said from behind them.  Steve whipped his head around and looked upon her with relief. 

“Baby, I’m sorry.  I got …” he ran a hand through his hair and adjusted his patch.  “… I got distracted.”

Kayla smiled.  “It’s ok.  I’m glad you had the, um, opportunity to have that distraction.”  She wanted to cry, herself, seeing her good friend again.  But she knew she needed to stay focused so they could get this over with.

“What the hell are you talking about? Jo demanded, suddenly not so jovial.  What are you two kids up to?”

Steve mentally pulled himself together and added this as yet another item on the buffet he was going to have to pass up.  “Marcus, um,” he took a deep breath.  “Kayla and I, we’re ending this tonight.  We’ve been going through some,” he lowered his eyes, “stuff, and we just decided this is it now.”

Marcus grinned with genuine delight.  “’Bout damn time, brother, don’t you think?”

“Steven Earl, you can’t be thinking of ruining Bil—Jack’s night, now, can you?!”

“Mama,” he said, “I don’t wanna go ‘round with you on this again.”  Steve took his mother by the shoulders and kissed her forehead.  “Can you trust me, please?  Trust me that I know what’s best for me and Kayla, and for Jack, too?”

Mama, Jo heard him say again in her head.

“Ok?  Just please trust me.”

Now it was Kayla’s turn.  “Marcus,” she said.  She kissed his cheek and hugged him.  “You’re a wonderful friend.  And in case I haven’t, ah, told you … lately … I love you for everything you did—that you do for me—for us.”

Marcus wasn’t buying any of it.  “What’s this fecal matter you people are trying to sling my direction, Steve?”

Steve let out a hearty guffaw.  “Homey, you always did have a way with words, man!”

“Kayla,” Jack bounded over to the group surrounding his wife.  “Where have you been, I was worried about you.” 

“Jack,” she said with as much of a smile as she could muster as he hugged her.  “I’m sorry it took me so long, car trouble.  I-i-it’s fine now, I made it fine.”

“You changed clothes?”

“Yes,” she began as she put a hand up to her hair, “I—“

Jack grabbed her hand.  He looked down upon her empty ring finger and, driven by some kind of knowing instinct, shot an angry glance at Steve.  “What happened here?”  He was holding Kayla’s arm way too hard, and Steve inwardly seethed as he watched Kayla twist her arm free of him.

“That’s what I was going to tell you, Jack, she practically spat, “my ring fell off my finger … you know how thin I got when I was ill, so it’s been loose for weeks, and it finally fell off tonight.  And, well, it went right into the river.  I tried to get it, but it’s lost, I’m afraid.”

You’re doin’ great, baby, keep it up, you can do it, Sweetness, Steve thought at her when she looked to him for a split second. 

“I got wet and filthy as I was lying on my stomach trying to fish it out of the river.”  Jack caught her glance at Steve and felt instantly skeptical.  “What, did you want me to show up to your victory party looking like I’d just been through a dirt factory?”

“So, you went home to change?”

“Yes, I went home to change.”

“You said you had car trouble.”

This was not going well.  “Yes, that’s because I did, Jack, why are you giving me the third degree in front of our friends?”  Kayla could see that last statement woke him up a bit to his behavior, appearances always very important to Jack.  “What’s the matter, are you alright?”

“Actually, I’m exhausted,” he said.

“I am, too,” Kayla said, jumping on the in his statement gave her.  “Actually, I have a terrible headache, and I really don’t feel well.  I’d like to get out of here as soon as possible.”

Before he could answer, Harper took the microphone to give the opening speech.  “How about right after the speeches,” Jack said.  “I’m feeling victorious, if you know what I mean. I think it’s time we celebrated properly, don’t you?”

Steve couldn’t believe his ears.  She’d just said she wasn’t feeling well, and all he wanted was to get out of there and have sex with her.  And he said so right in front of them all.  The part of Steve that had come to love Jack as his brother was so far away from him right now that all he could see was the monster who attacked Kayla.

Jack went to kiss her, and Kayla turned her cheek toward him.  “Jack,” she said harshly.  “I don’t feel well, show me a little courtesy, will you?”  She glanced back at the three of them behind her for effect, and Jack finally showed some decorum that the power coursing through him had overtaken.

“I’m sorry, honey.  You’re right.”

Harper then called the two of them up to the stage as he droned on and on.  Steve didn’t waste a moment and started in on Jo and Marcus immediately.  “Look, you two, I need your help.  I’ve gotta get out of here with Kayla.  She can’t leave here without me.  I don’t care who’s with us, but we have to be together.  Whatever happens, we have to be together.  Jo, can you ask Jack to take you home in the limo? 

“Oh, I don’t know—“

“Just ask him if he’ll give you, this special friend of his, some time before he goes home or something.”

“Steven, don’t drag me into whatever cockamamie—“

“Mama!”  Again, she was all ears.  “Mama, please, I know you don’t understand, and I don’t have time to explain it to you!”  Steve’s frustration was apparent, and Marcus started recognizing his buddy again.  “But I need this from you like you don’t know.  Please do this for me.  I haven’t asked you for much in my life, now just do this for me!”  He hated manipulating her like this, but there was no way to stay by Kayla when she and Jack left.  He had to get Jack out of the picture.

Jo sighed.  “Alright.  But I don’t like it!”

Steve kissed her.  “Thank you, Mama.” Jo reached a hand up to her cheek where her son had just kissed her.

“Now Marcus, you need to tell Kayla that you want to check her out.  You can’t let her leave with Jack.  I don’t care what it takes, but she has to leave here with me.  Not with him is even better, but no matter what it has to be with me.”

“You got it, Steve.  I’m with you, man.”

The speeches ended, and Steve put his hand to his head, motioning her to feel sick.

Kayla stepped off the stage and immediately swayed.  “Oh …”

“Go, Marcus,” Steve whispered to his friend, and in no time flat he was at Kayla’s side.  “Kayla, you don’t look good, are you feeling ok?”

“Marcus,” Kayla said airily, “no, actually, I’m not feeling well at all.”

“You dizzy?”

“Ah …” Marcus encouraged her to be dizzy with the look in his eyes.  “Yes, yes, I am.”

“Dr. Hunter, what’s wrong with her?” the Senator asked.

“I think she is having a bit of a relapse from the effects of the poison.”

“What?” Jack asked with concern.  “That was two months ago, how can she still be sick?”

“Well, I don’t think she is, Jack … here, sit down, Kayla,” he guided her to a chair, “But the poison did a lot of damage to her organs, and that takes a long time to heal from.”

“Neil Curtis gave her a clean bill of health.”

“No, he wouldn’t let her go campaigning with you, remember, I consulted on that as a friend of hers.  She is healthy, but dizzy spells are common after that kind of poisoning while the body continues to heal.  This has been a lot of excitement, and I think she needs some rest.”

“Then I’ll take her home right now,” Jack said.

“My head is pounding,” Kayla played it up, clasping her palms on either side of her head then lowering it to her lap.

“Sorry Jack, she can’t go home with you, I want to check her out at the hospital.”

“Is it that bad?” he asked with concern.

“I don’t think it’s anything to be too concerned about, but she needs to be looked at.”

“Ooohh,” Kayla moaned as the senator looked on curiously.

“Mama,” Steve whispered, “go ask him.”

“Now?  With Kayla sick like this?”

“She’s not really sick, Mama!  If you ever really wanted to see both of your sons happy, then you have to do this. If you don’t, I’m telling you, we’re all gonna catch hell, here!”  Jo implored him with a look.  “Go!”

Jack sat next to Kayla with his arm protectively around her, all thought no longer on anything but his wife and her well-being.  Kayla felt guilty; this was the Jack that Steve was slowly going to bring out as the years went by.

“I need to get her to University now, Jack,” Marcus said.

“Ok, I’ll go with you,” he said.  Kayla felt suddenly panicked.

“Jack,” Jo interjected.  “I think you should let Marcus take her to the hospital, and then let him take her home after.  You should go back to your apartment and make it comfortable for her, don’t you think?  Make sure the heat is back on, that the fridge is stocked?  I’ll help you, you can bring me with you and we’ll pick up a few things.  How’s that?”

“I really think I need to be with Kayla right now—“

“Well, there won’t be much you can do in the waiting room,” Marcus replied.  “But making sure the loft is ready for her would make a much bigger difference, good idea, Mrs. Johnson.”

“Come on, Jack.  Let me help you.  Your parents can hold down the festivities here, don’t you think?”

Kayla still had her head in her lap waiting for someone to fix it so that she wasn’t separated from Steve.  She looked briefly up into his eyes, and it was the first time they’d made eye contact in several minutes.  She felt a little better when he gave her a subtle nod. 

“Is that ok with you, Kayla?” Jack asked.

Kayla nodded, “Mm-hmm.  I’ll be ok with Marcus,” she said.  She didn’t want to look at him.

“Wait, what about your car?” Jack asked.

“I’ll drive it back to the loft for her, Jack,” Steve said.  He’d stood his ground in the same spot the whole time, not making an attempt to crowd the stage where she was now sitting with her head in her hands.  “No skin off my back, I’ve been supportin’ ya this long, may as well help you out with the car.”

Jack didn’t like it, but it made sense.  “Fine, Johnson.  That’s just fine.  Thanks.”

“Ok, let’s get started.  Kayla, let’s get you a drink of water before we head over, ok?”

“Yes, thank you, Marcus.”

“Jo,” Marcus prompted, “You and Jack should get started and make sure everything is ok over there.”

“Right,” Jo said.  She took Jack by the hand and watched Steve nonchalantly down a shot of something amber-colored as if he didn’t care a bit.  She knew they were plotting something, but she had a trust in Steve that she didn’t like but went with. “Let’s go to the store and get those things now, Jack.” 

Jack raised Kayla’s hand to his lips and kissed it, lingering his gaze on her empty ring finger and getting a bad feeling about this whole thing, but swallowing it down anyway.  “See you back at the apartment,” he said.  “Love you.”

Kayla looked up at him and smiled, then swayed a bit again, “Ooh,” before Marcus stuck a glass of water in her hands.

Jack told Angelica what was going on, just before he disappeared out the door with Jo, whom Steve mouthed “thank you” to when she turned her head to look at him right before she disappeared out the door.  Now Steve hovered a lot more closely as Angelica made her way toward them.  “Kayla, dear, I’ll go with you to the hospital.”

“No!” Kayla said too loudly.  “Someone needs to stay here at the victory party.”

“She’s right,” Harper said.  “Our place is here.  I think Dr. Hunter can take care of things.”

Never contradicting her husband in public, Angelica said fine and went about the business of talking up her stepson to everyone that would listen to her while Harper, happy to be rid of the whole lot of them, followed where she led him.

When it was just Steve and Marcus standing in front of Kayla who was still sitting with the glass of water to her lips, Marcus dropped the act and said, “If you wanna do this, then you’d better get out while the gettin’s good.”

“Thanks, man.  You don’t know what you just did tonight.”

“Oh I know, I’m adding it to the very long list of favors you owe me.  Good thing you have such a high credit limit.”

Steve looked into his friend’s eyes and wished he could confide in him. Wished he could tell him what was going on.  But he stayed silent.  Marcus saw the look in Steve’s eye and wanted to ask what the hell was happening, but he decided to save it.

“Ah, here are the keys to my car.  Thank you for, ah, taking it back home for me,” Kayla said for effect.

“Sure, baby, you get on to the hospital, now.  Hope you feel better.”

Then the three of them walked out together, Marcus with his arm around her to “steady” her.  When they were free of eyes and ears, Kayla threw her arms around Marcus and thanked him.  Then Steve gave him another bear hug and said meaningfully to him.  “You’re my best friend, Marcus.  The finest man I ever knew.  Ever.”  Then he took Kayla’s hand and they ran for the car and didn’t look back as they both silently shed a tear for him.

Chapter Text

Find Me
Chapter 18

Steve drove the short distance from Blondie’s back to his apartment where they needed to kill time before showing back up at the loft to break the news to Jack.  Kayla saw the ache of mourning on her husband’s face and reached out caress it, brushing away his tears.  The subject of Marcus had been a difficult one for Steve ever since his memories returned.  Kayla had had the opportunity to mourn him for many years, but Steve didn’t.  He came back to himself without his best friend, the man who grew up with him in the orphanage and whom he’d come to confide in and rely on like no other.

What Kayla didn’t realize was that Steve was battling not only the loss staring him in the face, but the fact that Steve allowed himself to lose focus of where Kayla was at a crucial moment in this jump.  The jump could have easily happened in that time, and he didn’t stay focused.

“I wasn’t prepared to see Marcus, Sweetness.  I just …”  Kayla reached out for his hand.  “… it was like I really was seeing a ghost.”

“I know.”  She brought the back of his hand to her lips and then to her own cheek.  “I know how much you miss him.”

 “This won’t be the last time, Kayla,” he said, his tone serious.  “We’re gonna run into more people on these jumps that are dead now.”

“You’re right,” Kayla said.  “We’re just going to have to take it as it comes, I guess.  You did the best you could seeing Marcus, and so did I.”  Steve let out a pfft.  “Steve, how were we supposed to react?  Do you think I would have kept it together if it were my pop?  Her voice cracked.  “We’re only human.  I remember when I saw John for the first time after we all thought he was Roman. I was overwhelmed that I got my brother back.  That’s kind of how I felt here, I got Marcus back.  For as long as we’re here, that is.  It must have been that much harder for you,” she said meaningfully. 

They’d arrived at the apartment by now, and Steve turned off the ignition and turned to her in his seat.  “Kayla, that’s the problem.  It was harder for me.  I was so engrossed in it all that I forgot that I was supposed to be keeping an eye on you.  Wasn’t that the whole point?  What if we see him again? Or someone else that gets me,” he paused and adjusted his patch, “like this?”  What if while I’m payin’ attention to them I lose track of you?”  He held his wife’s face in his hand, and she felt the anxiety in his touch.  “This jumping is doing something to me, baby.  I can’t keep my emotions under control.”

“You’re human.”  She turned her face into his palm and kissed it.  Then she held onto it with both of hers and brought it to her heart.  “You’re allowed to give away some of your attention.  You’re allowed to feel.  We both are.” 

Steve looked into her eyes through his damp one and whispered, “God, I miss him.” 

“I know,” she said with as much love and support as she could give.

Steve closed the basement apartment door behind them as he tried to shake off the heaviness he was feeling.  “Welcome home, Sweetness.”

Still at the top of the stairs, Kayla wrapped her arms around his neck.  “It is, you know.  My home is wherever you are.”

“Come here, baby,” he said almost forgetting that he was upset and gave her a soft, warm kiss that would have sent a charge though Kayla if she hadn’t become so completely exhausted. 

“I’m so tired,” she said, eyeing the bed and pining to be asleep in it as she rested her head on his chest.  Steve was just as tired as Kayla, and he was starving, too. 

“When do you think we last ate, ‘cause I don’t remember getting a meal since the house.”

Kayla thought about it. “You’re right,” she said.  

Steve sighed.  “Baby, we can’t sleep, we need to get to the loft.”

“Just a quick nap,” she asked pleadingly.

“How about dinner instead?  You know I can whip up a dinner in no time, here.”

“Can I take that “no time” to close my eyes?”

Steve laughed.  “I don’t think I have a choice, here, do I?  Alright, come on, baby,” he walked her down the stairs and sat her on the bed where she immediately plopped down on her side.

“Mm.  Good.”

“Yeah, I’ll bet it feels good. Wish I could lay there with you.”

“Smells good, too,” she smiled with closed eyes and a wide grin.

“I’m not cookin’ anything yet, baby.”

“The bed,” she said.  “Smells like you.”  She took a final deep breath and was out like a light right before his eyes.  Steve dragged his knuckles over her face then took the blanket from the chair and covered her with it.

Steve did the best he could with the food he had in the apartment.  It was a far cry from what he had at home and he felt homesick at the thought of it.  But he did enjoy poking around the place now that they had some time to kill here and really took stock of what was there.  For food, they were pretty much stuck with canned soup, which he added some cut up celery, rice, and spices to and put that on low so Kayla could get a little more time to her nap.  “Hey, baby,” he whispered to himself, “I found the tomatoes.”  He threw those into a couple of salads with the rest of the celery, and a cucumber.  He also made some toast.  She’s going to complain about the carbs.  “Oh well.”

While the soup heated, and his wife slept deeply, Steve went to the bathroom.  He listened to the pipes squeak, opened drawers, and went through the small collection of books he had.  Right away he opened the cookbook Kayla had given him for Christmas and read their poem.  He noticed how crisp and clean those pages were here and was a bit surprised, as they were a little worn back at home.  He tucked it under his arm and went back to the drawers.  When he saw the shoebox he opened it and smiled.  His toy train was there, along with the old photos.  Then ran his fingers over the old metal and thought about where that shoebox was now back at home; Kayla had kept it all those years. 

The smell of the soup shook him from his reverie, and he looked at the clock.  They really needed to get going pretty soon.  He hated to do it, but it was time to wake Kayla; 30 minutes was really all he felt safe giving her, though he really needed 30 minutes of shuteye, himself.  He gave the soup a final stir and turned off the heat before sitting beside his wife and gently waking her.

“Hey baby,” Steve said when she opened her eyes.

For a moment, Kayla didn’t know where she was.  But then she looked up into the young and handsome face of her husband and smiled.  “Hey.”

“You looked so peaceful sleepin’ there, Sweetness, but we’ve gotta get movin’ soon.” 

She forced herself to sit up in bed and try to wake up.  Part of her wanted to just stay there; if everything was going to reset, what did it matter?  But she was worried about how long they’d be there and knew they were going to have to just do this. 

The smell wafting over from the hotplate woke her up more fully.  “What did you make us?” she asked and licked her lips.

Steve caught that unconscious gesture that always caused his arousal to stir and reached a hand over to rub her thigh.

“It’s not much, but it’ll work.  Soup, salad, and toast.”

“Toast?”

“Sorry, all out of breadsticks.  We need energy, Sweetness.”  

Steve rubbing her thigh caused another kind of hunger in her belly.  Steve saw that hunger flicker in her eyes and unwillingly removed his hand from her thigh.

“Nope!” he stood up fast.  “No, we have to eat food now, baby.  Food.”

“Remember my favorite food, Steve?”

“Are you tryin’ to kill me?”  He roughly pulled out the chair of the table across from the bed, the drag echoing loudly in the room.  “Now sit.  Here.  I’ll get our dinner.”

Kayla grinned with enjoyment at Steve’s reaction to her.  She loved how he always made her feel like she was what he wanted more than anything else.  She sat down just as he put the plates down in front of them, then he lifted his leg over the chair and sat down heavily.  “But, baby,” he said as he shifted to find a more comfortable position for the uncomfortable bulge in his jeans, “if we’re still here after we tell Jack, the first thing we’re going to do when we get back here is make love in that bed.”

Kayla gave him a very sexy smile as she lifted a spoonful of soup to her lips.  “I like the sound of that,” she said with promise in her voice.

Steve ate every bit of food on his plate in about five minutes.  Kayla realized how hungry she was at the first mouthful and followed suit a little more slowly.  Then she got up and brought the dishes to the sink.  When she came back she sat in Steve’s lap and kissed him.  “Thank you,” she said.

“Baby, I should make you soup more often.”

“For taking such good care of me all the time.  In every time.”

“Oh, baby.  You’re easy to take care of.”

Kayla dug under the front of Steve’s shirt, which he reacted to by hardening beneath her.  Kayla felt it right away and laughed, “Don’t start!  I’m in here for something else.” 

“What do you expect, baby, you’re making him squirm.”

She found what she was looking for and lifted the chain over her husband’s head.  “Make me an honest woman again, please, Mr. Johnson.”

“Oh, so that’s what you were digging for.  I’ll let you dig for something else later,” he said as he took the ring from her, undid the clasp on the chain and slipped her beloved solitaire on her finger again.  “I still do, Sweetness.”

“I still do, too,” she replied, then gave him a lingering kiss to his scarred cheek.  “We have to go, don’t we?”

“Don’t you think we should?”

“Yes,” she sighed. “I’m so happy right here at the moment that I don’t want to leave.”  She stood up and went to the sink to clean up the few dishes they’d used.  Steve watched her wash the dishes with her back to him.  It reminded him of their last night at home before they began jumping, and the homesick feeling rushed over him again. 

Steve went to his beautiful wife, put his arms around her from behind, and placed a kiss on her cheek.  “Come on, Sweetness, let’s get this over with.”

This time they drove the Bluesmobile over to the loft.  When they approached the building’s front door, a panicked feeling came over Kayla.  She looked to him with scared eyes, and Steve gathered her up into his arms and held her.  “It’s almost over, baby.  This is going to be quick.”

“Last … last time we did this, he’d already raped me.  Now he hasn’t, and … and I don’t really know what to say to him now.”  Kayla pulled away slightly to run a hand over her hair, which she knew was becoming a bit of a mess. 

“Well, that’s fine, ‘cause you’re not saying anything to him, I am.”

“You?” she said with surprise.  “He’s my—.“  She cut herself off before the word left her lips.

“You’d better not be saying what you’re about to say, Kayla.”  The look on his unsmiling face was stern and almost wounded.

“Steve …”

“Don’t you say it,” he hissed in an angry swell that had quickly overtaken him.  He advanced on Kayla with a look of green fire, slowly backing her up against the wall of the side of the building.

“Steve,” she put her hands on his chest, “I’m so sorry.  You know that’s not what I meant.”  The hurt in his eye upset her.  She’d hurt him.  The thought of her with any other man hurt him.

“But you almost said it, Kayla.  I don’t want you saying it!”  Now her back was up against the cold, hard brick of the building, their bodies just centimeters from touching.

“Calm down!” she said with her own fire.  “I know who I am, and I know who my husband is. Has always been since before we ever took a vow.”

“Kayla Johnson, that’s who you are, dammit!  Steve now pinned her against the brick with the weight of his body and crushed his lips down upon hers.  She whimpered with emotion and sexual need as his body pressed against hers.  “Kayla…” he lifted her leg up as he pressed his firm thigh against her center.  “Caroline…” his lips sucked on the tender flesh joining her shoulder and neck as she thrust her hips hard against him, “Johnson,” he pulled her back to him and kissed her with desperate possession.  

Kayla kissed him back with the same intensity.  She felt how much he needed her, and she wanted to let him have her.  She wanted to heal the hurt her words caused with the feeling of her vagina closed tightly around him.

He pulled his lips from her and held her face with a more gentle grasp. “Please,” he said softly.  Please don’t say it again.  Don’t think it.  I can’t take it.”

“I’m sorry, baby.  I’m sorry.”  Then her eyes burned her love into his before they turned to something sexy and reckless.  Kayla’s hands fell to Steve’s waistband and undid the button.

“What are you doing, Sweetness?” he singsonged as he looked around to make sure no one was watching them.  Even in the shadow of this side of the building, anyone could have driven up and parked their car. 

“I love you.  I’m sorry my words hurt you … again,” she said with a tear.  She reached her right hand into his jeans and stroked his naked erection, feeling the slippery fluid that had leaked from its tip. 

The feel of her thumb rubbing his cum around the head of his cock was like velvet. He had very little control at this point and wanted to come right away, but this was a dangerous place for them to be, and he fought like mad to keep his head.

“Baby, this is … ohhhh,” he moaned as she stroked him harder.  “Kayla, I don’t want you to stop.”

“Good, ‘cause I’m not going to.”  She held his gaze with lustful intensity.

In one move, he removed her hand from his pants, turned her, and then lifted her onto the ladder that led to the fire escape.  “Head to the roof, baby, I’m right behind you.”

Kayla’s need to satisfy her husband was intense, and she made her way to the roof that meant so much to them as fast as her legs could take her.  As soon as they arrived, Steve made a “shh” motion and looked down into the skylight. The loft looked empty.  He didn’t think Jack and Jo had arrived back yet.  Steve took her hand and led her quietly down the stairs into their bedroom.  Once inside, he peered down the spiral staircase and saw it was just as dark as their bedroom. 

Kayla was still looking at him like she was going to devour him, and though he didn’t think it was possible, his erection grew.  “We’re alone?” she asked, her breathing becoming more labored.

“We are, baby.”

With no further invitation, Kayla pushed Steve backwards onto the bed and crawled on top of him. Straddling his crotch with hers, she kissed him hard, raking her teeth across his bottom lip. Then she trailed her hot lips down his neck to his tattoo and bit the flesh of his chest before bathing it with her warm mouth.

“If we ever jump there, you stop that wedding to Jack, Steve.  Promise me.”

“I promise you,” he panted.  “I promise you that I’ll never let you marry him again.  And I promise you I’ll never leave you again. I’ll never let that happen again, Sweetness.  Never.”

“I’m sorry I almost said that.”

Kayla reached down and unzipped his jeans, then slid off of him to the floor on her knees and tugged them down.  Steve wiggled out of them and released his full erection that so desperately wanted to be inside of her.  She gently held his throbbing cock in her hands as he sat up.  Looking down at Kayla, her lips were so plump and her eyes so luminous when she looked back up at him. 

“You’re so beautiful,” Steve whispered.  “How could I have ever let you go?”

Kayla slowly shook her head and placed a finger to her lips. Then she licked them and took him into her mouth as far as he would go, running her tongue over him as she did.

“Oohh” Steve moaned loudly.  He selfishly held her head and guided it where he wanted it to go. He couldn’t help it, he was insane with the feel of her hot mouth around his throbbing cock.  “Baby, God, Kayla …”  He kept moaning and she kept sucking, and the sounds of his pleasure and taste of what leaked from the tip made her release a gush of her own aroused wetness. 

“I know you’re wet.  I wanna taste you, too.  Let me taste you.”  He tried pulling her up to straddle his face on the bed, but she stayed on her knees. 

“No.  This is about you, I want this right now to be about you.”

That’s when they heard the loft door open and the voices of Steve’s mother and brother sail up the stairs to their crestfallen ears.

Steve looked down at Kayla and grabbed her hands in his.  “What are we doing?!”

Kayla’s eyes grew big.  She got up and brushed herself off, then looked in the mirror and saw that her hair was beyond repair.  She threw big guilty-looking eyes at Steve and whispered, “I’m sorry.”

Steve smiled with disappointment that she thought she did something wrong.  “No, Sweetness,” he whispered, “don’t be sorry.  We can’t help it sometimes how much we love each other.”  Steve tucked his rapidly deflating penis back into his jeans then buttoned back up. 

Kayla placed a loving kiss on her husband’s cheek.  “Let’s just go down these stairs and tell him, Steve.  Jo is there, so we have a buffer.”

“A buffer?”

“He won’t do anything insane in front of her.”

Steve nodded.  “But I’m doing the talking.”

“Ok,” she agreed. “My husband will do the talking,” 

Steve took her hand and put it to his lips where he kissed it. “I love you, Sweetness.”

“I love—.“ She felt the tug in her belly so strongly that the queasy feeling didn’t wait till she’d left this body.  “—you, too … oh no.”

They grabbed each other and held on tight.

“Looks like neither one of us is doing the talking, Sweetness,” Steve said. 

The last thing Steve saw before the jump was their bed as the moonlight shone down upon it.  The next thing he saw was confusing, because he was positive he’d jumped, the need to vomit front and center.  But the bed was still there.  Only now Kayla was standing in front of it twirling something around over her head and shouting very loudly.

 “Baby?”  Steve said.  “You’re only half-dressed, there.  When are we?”

The shouting stopped immediately, and Kayla dropped the fabric this body had just been whipping around.  She looked at Steve through bewildered, glassy eyes.  “Wheh n’arewe?”  She looked around.  “I dunno, Big Boy, buh’look!  Same place!”  She immediately started laughing hysterically, then stopped just as suddenly as her gorge rose.  “Oh, I don’ feel good.  You nauseous?  I’m nauseous.”

Steve looked upon his wife and realized where he was pretty sure they’d landed.  He smiled, because she was about the most adorable thing he’d ever seen in his life, but he also cringed, because he knew they never made love in this time, and there was nothing he wanted more right now than to get inside of her and let himself explode with the orgasm he’d had pent up for what seemed like days.

“I know why yer grinnin’, baby,” she said.  “You wanna bone me.  I wanna bone you, too.  Buh … wait for the nauseous … the jump makes me sick … iss’gonna go away.”

Steve sighed heavily.  “Naw, baby, I think this time it’s gonna linger awhile.  Ya know why?”

“Why?” she said as she tried to reach for his cock.

“’Cause you’re drunk, Sweetness.”

Chapter Text

Find Me
Chapter 19

“Drunk?” Kayla slurred as she closed her eyes to try to keep the room from spinning. “I’m not drunk, Steve…,” she said making a concerted effort to enunciate her words to prove just how drunk she wasn’t, “just a little…d…dizzy from the jump.”

Steve chuckled at the sight despite the churning he felt in his own stomach.  Standing there in her slip and blouse with her eyes closed tight and a deep furrow gracing her brow, she had to be the cutest thing he’d ever seen.

“Open your eyes, Sweetness … take a look around,” he said as he stepped forward and took her hand.

Her eyes fluttered open and she looked around the room.  “We’re still in the loft. I don’unerstand, I could have sworn we jumped,” she said as she swayed and stumbled into him.

“Whoa, there baby.  How about we sit?” he said as he guided her to the edge of the bed then sat beside her.

“I know what you’re doing, Steve,” she said with a smile as she leaned into him and inhaled his scent. “You just want to get me in bed. But, let me tell you a secret,” she whispered as she leaned up to his ear.  “I’m a sure thing, big boy.”

Steve laughed out loud and wrapped an arm around her shoulders to hold her up.  He could smell the alcohol on her breath and the scent brought a rush of memories back to his mind.  A vision of Kayla summoning him to the bed.  Her falling asleep in his arms. Her curled up under the covers. Clear as day, the visions flooded his mind’s eye and his heart tightened at the love he felt for her.

The feel of her tongue snaking around his ear quickly drew him back to the present. He knew her actions were fueled by alcohol, but despite that, he couldn’t help that they were sending a jolt of excitement straight to his groin. 

“Baby, do you know where we are?” he asked in hopes that she might be distracted from the glorious torture her tongue was now performing.

“I do,” she whispered as she trailed her lips down his neck.  “We’re in our bed.”  She fumbled with the buttons on her blouse not quite getting them to cooperate.

“No, I mean do you know when we are?”

Kayla’s mind was racing against the alcohol that was slowing it down.  She knew they had just jumped, but the concept that there was a “when” involved was completely lost on her as her libido driven by both the lust in her consciousness and the drunkenness of this body dominated all thought. “We are about to make love,” she replied as her hand made its way up his thigh and to his groin.

At that moment, Steve wanted nothing more than to cover her body with his and rock them both into oblivion.  But, he knew it wasn’t right.  Not only had they not made love yet in this time, but also she was drunk. 

“Kayla.  Baby, stop and look at me,” he said his voice a little more stern than he intended.

“I’m looking,” she said with heavy-lidded eyes and that sexy smile he just couldn’t resist.  “An’ I’m loving what I see.” She’d gotten through all of her buttons now and shimmied out of the blouse as it pooled behind her on the bed.

Steve’s control was starting to falter, but her drunken state sent alarm bells ringing in his head.  So he tried desperately to focus her. “Sweetness,” he said firmly as he grabbed her under the chin sending her mouth into an adorable little squish.  She was so dammed cute coming on to me that night.  “Now, we’ve got to have a real conversation, here, baby, don’t you think?  Listen, your body might be drunk, but focus your mind, this is kind of a big thing we’ve discovered.”

“So serious,” Kayla replied with a deep set look of humoring him.

“Oh, baby,” he sighed, starting to get frustrated in more ways than one.  “You jumped into a drunk body, Kayla.  And now you are, too.  Can you see that?”  Kayla tried to wade through the intoxication and listen to his words as Steve valiantly plowed on.  “Because this body you leaped into is drunk, the 2009 Kayla is, too.  I know it’s hard, but doesn’t that strike you as a little unsettling?”

Kayla’s mind made a very real effort to process what Steve was saying. And somewhere inside her a red flag did go off that her body could control her consciousness.  But the effect of the alcohol was making it a very real struggle to focus.  She knew he was right, she knew it was important, but her body wanted what it wanted. And right now, it wanted him inside her.  It wanted to feel his hardness between her legs.  It wanted her breasts in his mouth.  It wanted hot sex.  And it wanted it now.

Steve was fascinated by this internal struggle he saw shine in her eyes as she tried to be sober, but when she licked her lips he saw the attempt at sobriety step aside for all the lust she was feeling.

“Make love to me,” Kayla said.

Steve felt himself slipping over the edge as she leaned in to to press her lips to his.  He knew in that moment that if he didn’t get up then, he wouldn’t be getting up for some time.  “Nope, Kayla, we’re not going to do this,” he blurted out as he dodged her lips and quickly rose from the bed.  She attempted to follow, but he stopped her with a hand.  “No, baby, you stay right there.”

“But Steve, I wanna come with you,” she pouted.

“I know, he said with patronizing frustration, “but right now I think it’s best if you stay right there.”

“Right here?” she asked with a sly tone to her voice.  She scooted up on the bed and leaned back into the headboard.  His eye followed her motion, and he couldn’t help but notice how it caused her slip to rise up on her bare legs.

Seeing the effect she was having on him, Kayla continued.  “You know what, Steve?”

“What baby?” he asked as he shifted nervously from left to right and looked at anything but her.

“I’m cold all by myself in this big ol’ bed.  I think you should strip off that sexy duster.  I think you should come sit right here with me … and keep me warm,” she sing-songed, patting the spot beside her.

“No-ooo,” he sing-songed back, “I don’t think that’s a good idea.  I think I should, uh, go downstairs and uh ... check things out.” We would have made love that night.  We didn’t, but we would have.  Why can’t we do it now?

Kayla lowered her eyes and stared at him as she seductively bit her lower lip.  Then, as she shook her head, she whispered “I don’t want you to go.” 

She held out her hand to him, and it was as if the earth was propelling him forward … he couldn’t help but take it.

“Now, get over here,” she said giving him a firm tug.  He stumbled forward, onto the bed and on top of her, and as her lips found his all thought of leaving was lost.  His mouth covered hers and he groaned as her tongue made its way into his mouth.

Kayla’s hands reached under his duster, wound their way around his shoulders and down his back, and slipped the coat off his shoulders before softly gripping the curve of his rear.  He moaned as she pulled his hips into her and began grinding herself against his expanding crotch.

“Steve,” she whimpered as she began to rock rhythmically against him.  “Please make love to me.  I want to feel you inside of me.  I want to feel you come inside of me.”

While Steve’s mind fought for control, his hands and hips moved of their own accord.  His right hand moved up her body and across her soft, silk-covered breast before making its way to the strap that held the skimpy fabric place. 

“Oh baby,” he moaned as he pushed the strap down her shoulder and trailed hot kisses across her neck.  “I want you so bad, Kayla.”

He moaned again and pressed his denim-clad flesh into her.  Her breath quickened and she pushed her core against him more urgently.  He knew then that the battle was lost.  “That’s it, Kayla...I can’t take it anymore.  I want you too bad,” he said as he gave over to the inevitable outcome. 

He reached between them to his jeans. “Baby, are you wet for me?”

Silence.

“Kayla,” he started as he broke away and pressed up to see her face.  His balls screamed for release even as he let out a genuine laugh of amusement when he saw his wife’s head loll to the side with the sleep that had overtaken her.  “Baby, baby, baby,” he chuckled as he gently cupped her head and laid her down on the bed.  “Again you’re doin’ this to me.  What am I gonna do with you, Sweetness?”

Steve had half a mind to get himself off, but instead he layed there next to her sleeping form and for the millionth time since this whole fiasco started let himself calm down. It took a little while, but eventually the ache in his groin subsided. 

“’You wanna bone me?’  That’s a new one, baby,” he softly laughed to himself as he turned his head to look at her.  “Ooooh, man, we’ve gotta get you drunk more often.”

Steve got up, went to the bathroom, and looked at his slicked back poof of hair at the front of his head.  “This was not a good hair day for you, dude,” he muttered to himself as he turned off the light and left the bathroom.  When he came back, he picked up the discarded clothing that had accumulated on the floor and hung everything up nicely.  It was something he did a lot of, even to this day.  Kayla would leave clothes on the floor, and Steve would pick them up.  It was a leftover behavior from the orphanage; there was never enough space to have the few things you owned laying about, so he was forced to be tidy.  The small spaces of the merchant marine ships, not to mention his tiny apartments, only reinforced this behavior.  Kayla, on the other hand, left stuff all over the place.  He ribbed her about it, but the truth was that he enjoyed it more than he admitted to her.  As he found a hanger for the black and white blouse that had been kicked off the bed, he inhaled her lavender scent and felt another surge of love for her. 

Finally, Steve took off his boots and slipped back into the bed with her.  I like a man who sleeps with his boots on, he remembered.  This time she was dead to the world and didn’t so much as stir as he leaned back against the pillows.  As Steve laid in the silence, he was alone with his thoughts.  And if he was being honest with himself, those thoughts weren’t very comforting.

Why is this happening to us?  What is going on?  It was a question Kayla had asked many times since they’d started jumping. Steve had put the question off every time.  What could they do about it?  But the truth was that he was completely unnerved by what was happening to them.  He was worried all the time.  If he wasn’t worried about where they had just jumped from then he was worried about where they might jump next. And if he wasn’t worried about that, then he was worried about who was taking care of Joe back home and if their bodies went on business as usual to take care of Stephanie after they’d left those bodies.   He worried about when they’d be jumping and how long they had till it inevitably happened.  And beneath all that, was the secret concern that he did his best to ignore …

That he was crazy, after all.

Now, lying here in their bed, feeling alone for the first time since he’d gone to sleep with his wife in his arms in a late evening in 2009, he had no choice but to face these questions, face these fears.  Steve broke out in a cold sweat and sat up to take off his grey button-down shirt.  Underneath was the same sleeveless green t-shirt that he’d worn (would wear again?) in the elevator.  As he layed back down, the fear drove him to instinctively reach out for Kayla’s hand that rested peacefully beside her. 

“This time jumping … it has to be man-made …”  Steve remembered Kayla’s words.  Was it man-made?  “Who are you, Dr. Samuel Beckett?  Who does that make me, Al?”  No, he re-thought, that makes us both Dr. Samuel Beckett, Sweetness. It makes the person pulling the strings Al.  Steve dragged his hand down his face with a deep breath.  This isn’t a TV show, man.  Maybe we’re stuck in a time loop or something.  Steve thought about that with serious consideration.  Are we travelling through time?  Is there some wormhole we got sucked into after we fell asleep?  Steve didn’t know the laws of physics past E=MC², and he didn’t even know what the E, M, or C stood for.  Still, he tried to find some kind of scientific explanation on this absurd thing that has happening to them.  Something in motion tends to stay in motion … friction stops it.  Or something like that.  Maybe some kind of friction is stopping our jumps. 

Steve rolled his eyes.  He didn’t know what the hell he was talking about. 

His brief trip into junior high school science ended when he noticed the feel of Kayla’s hand in his.  Her empty hand.  There was no ring on it.  Steve immediately felt up to his chest with his free hand.  “Shit” he whispered.  He had nothing to put on her finger.  It upset him.  And that anger fueled more anger at the fact that he didn’t know if he thought this was man-made or some kind of scientific blip, which brought him right back to crazy.

He glanced over at the clock and saw that it was 8:02pm.  Then he looked over at Kayla’s still sleeping form.  He really wanted to wake her.  He knew it was the alcohol and that she didn’t really need the sleep like she had at his apartment on their previous jump.  And he just needed her awake with him.  He was also afraid to jump with only one of them awake. It wasn’t really a rational fear, their first jump happened when they were both asleep. But he was suspicious of everything and just wanted her alert.  He looked back at the clock and decided to give her five more minutes.  Meanwhile, his heart raced with uncertainty and fear as he laid there alone with his fears.

Steve brought Kayla’s hand to his face and held it there.  “I’m not crazy, baby,” he said as he closed his eyes to the feel of her hand.  “I’m going to get you home.  I’m not going to let you down, Kayla, I’ll get our family back.”  An image of Kayla’s haunted face looking back at him from the front seat of a car right after Adrienne had broken him out of the sanitarium came to him unbidden.  Steve pushed it away.  “I’m not crazy, Sweetness.  I promise you I’m not,” he whispered.

“Of course, you’re not.”  Steve turned his head to see Kayla looking up at him with sleepy blue eyes. 

“Baby …”

“You’re not crazy,” she said again with clear-sounding sobriety.  “I love you.”  Her half-lidded gaze made him think twice about that sobriety.  “Or if you are, at least this time I get to come along with you.”

This made Steve laugh as she snuggled up against him.  “Well, I know you’re sane, Sweetness, so I guess I’m safe, then.”

Kayla lifted her head and looked him square in the eye.  She was feeling strange.  A little euphoric, a little dizzy, and a little sick all at the same time.  I think I’m still just a little drunk.  But her husband’s obvious war with himself shoved past the alcohol.  “Don’t ever doubt yourself again, Steve.  Promise me that you won’t ever think that again.  Please,” she said with a gravity that made clear that this was to be the last they spoke of it. 

Steve swallowed a lump in his throat.  “I’m … afraid, Kayla,” he whispered as his voice broke.  “I’m afraid that I’m not right.  That I’m letting you down somewhere …” 

She palmed his face in her right hand.  “You could never let me down.  Unless you give up on me and decide you’re crazy.  You aren’t.  We’re in this together.  And I need you.”

Steve nodded as Kayla caressed his face.  She reached up to his neck and kissed him.  He relished the feel of her soft lips on his skin and didn’t want her to stop. 

“I love you.  I love you so much, baby.”

Kayla nuzzled into the crook of his neck and said, “I think I fell asleep.”

“You think so, huh?  Yeah, you might have fallen asleep on me, baby.”

“Sorry.  It was the alcohol.”

“I know.  You were adorable.  It was a lot like it went the first time, I think.”

“Well, I have to rely on you to do the remembering on that one, because I don’t recall any of that at all.”

“I was ready to have my way with you.  Both times,” Steve said.  Kayla laughed.  “But I guess fate stepped in both times and said no.”

Kayla looked up at him with longing.  “Well, I’m saying yes.”

In answer, Steve reached over and fondled her breast through the silky slip.  She whimpered as her core ached with wetness.  “Does it count if we didn’t make love but we wanted to?  Because I know I wanted to.”

“You’re asking me?  I don’t know, baby, that was your rule, remember?”  He grabbed her rear and pushed her into him as he ground his new erection into her.  “The problem is that you got me believing it, and I’m not sure this is a good idea.”

“He says as he starts to impale me.”

“Oh … God,” he moaned as he quickly flipped her over to her back and roughly thrusted against her as he sucked on her neck.  “Your words drive me crazy, Kayla.  I don’t think I can stop, baby.”

Just then, Kayla felt a wave of nausea.  It did not, however, come with any other signs of an impending jump.  “Steve …”  She instinctively pushed him away from her and sat up quickly.  “Ooohh … I feel sick.”

“Well, I guess I’m stopping,” he groaned and he laid on his back with his erection straining against his jeans.

“I’m sorry!  I think I’m hung over.”

“Oh, I don’t think, baby.  Let me get you some water, it’ll help.”

“Don’t leave me!”

“I’m just getting you some water from the bathroom, Kayla.  It’s ok.”

She nodded and slowly dropped her head into her hands, gratefully downing the water when Steve returned with it.  The nausea subsided a bit, but the headache had now arrived full force.  He pulled her into an embrace as she rested her head against her husband’s chest.

“I’m glad you woke up, baby.  I missed you.”

“Mm.  I was here the whole time.”

“Yeah, well, it’s just as well that you did.  I think sex would have been the wrong thing to do on this one.”

“Didn’t want to take advantage of me, huh?”

“Well, that was the first time.  This time I was perfectly willing to take full advantage of you, baby.  You just fell asleep before I could get inside you.”

A thrill worked its way through Kayla’s hungover body.  “My turn to be driven crazy by your words.”  She giggled, and her head didn’t like being jostled.  “Ugh … I need out of this body.”

That reminded Steve of what he’d been trying to tell her.  “Baby, that’s what I meant before.  You weren’t drunk when you got here, but your body was, and your body won.”   Kayla had a vague recollection of this conversation, but this time the meaning of this instilled a cold fear in her.  “That means we can’t control what’s going on in our bodies when we get into them, Kayla.” 

Kayla thought of all the places they could jump that would be less than stellar.  “I’m not sure if my head hurts more from the hangover or this little nugget,” she said. 

Steve kissed the top of her head.  “We need to be prepared for whatever body we get.”

“Like when I was … deaf?”

“I’ve got to admit, I’m rusty, Sweetness.”

Kayla sat up and looked at her husband.  She didn’t need words.  He knew she was as scared of losing control of her body as he was of being crazy.  He looked at her with all the love he had in his heart and made the sign for courage.  She repeated the sign. Then he leaned over and gently kissed her.  They embraced, and he whispered, “courage, baby” softly into her ear.

The tug at Kayla’s diaphragm nearly made Kayla throw up right there.  She pulled away and barely got out, “do you … mmf …”

“Yeah, that’s not the hangover.”  They held tightly to each others’ hands as the jump took them.

Kayla arrived into inky darkness that smelled of motor oil and exhaust.  She knew right away that she was in a vehicle of some kind, and between the hangover of the jump before and the winding roads they were driving down, the jump effect was harsher than usual.  Kayla sank her head into Steve’s chest as she grabbed for him with a moan.  Only instead of her head meeting the firm body of her husband, it met the cold, hard exterior of a cardboard box while her hands came up empty.

The hairs immediately rose on the back of Kayla’s neck. 

“Steve?” she whispered, with wide, searching eyes that couldn’t be seen.  When no reply came, she skipped right past “more loudly” and went straight on to desperate shout, whipping her head around trying to see something, anything in the shadows.  “Steve!”  The sounds that met her were not those she wanted to hear, of her husband telling her he was there with her; they were only the sounds of this lone vehicle’s tires driving down the road.

It took a few moments for her to take it in, but she eventually let herself admit that Steve wasn’t there.  And this time, unlike on the pier, he really, really wasn't there.

Chapter Text

Find Me
Chapter 20

It was only her training as a trauma nurse and then a surgeon that prevented Kayla from going into immediate panic.  She closed her eyes and took a deep breath. When she opened them, her eyes had adjusted to the dark enough that she could make out a very cramped space.  As she took stock of her surroundings, she tried somewhat unsuccessfully to control her tears.

Think, Kayla, where are you?  Wherever it was, it was moving.  Trunk?  No, I’m sitting up.  Kayla was sitting cross-legged with her back against a wall.  No, not a wall, she realized as she felt behind her, it’s another box.  She rocked up to her knees and felt around in the small area and saw that she was mostly surrounded by boxes.  What is this place?  Kayla didn’t recognize it as any place she’d been before.  This only made her heart beat faster and her fear spill down her face in big salty tears.   

Steve had to fight to focus on the man that was standing in front of him when he arrived into his 1989 body.  Everything was weird about this jump from minute one.  It was hot, his hair was off his neck, his face felt strange, and his vision was a little blury.  As he tried to take hold of Kayla with his right hand, he reached up with the left one to adjust his patch and ended up grabbing the lens of the glasses that were inexplicably sitting on his face.

“What the hell?” he mumbled as the glasses jostled off his face and onto the ground. Then he realized with horror that he was in public without his patch.

“Did you hear me?”

Steve instinctively clapped his hand over his left eye to shield it from view and lowered his head.  Where the hell am I?!  Now Steve saw the man wearing a blue and yellow flannel more clearly, but for the life of him he didn’t know who he was.

“What?” Steve asked as he distractedly looked around for Kayla, the alarm building in him with each passing second.

“I said you’d better go greet your congregation, Brother, because sermon or no sermon, they’re filing in.”  Steve gaped at him as a distant memory started to take shape.  Distant and very fuzzy.  “What’s wrong with your eye, you got something in it?”

The eye his fingers were feeling beneath his hand was all wrong. Completely wrong.  It didn’t feel like the scar he knew, it felt like – like an eye.  That’s when Steve realized that for the first time 20 years, he had two good eyes.  One was real, one was glass, but his face was whole again.  “This is Saul’s Retreat,” he said with dread as he slowly lowered his hand from his eye and stood up straight again.

The man glanced behind him at the followers getting seated for their sermon, then back at Steve with suspicion.  “You been drinkin’, Brother Daniel?  You’ve lost your twang.”

Steve fought the chaos in his head to think and think fast.  Daniel Something – Lucas!  Daniel Lucas … Peach Creek, not Tree … Emily & Gideon’s bible … Marcus and Cleaver … the cave … That’s all he remembered.  Where is Kayla right now?  Is she at home?  My God, we’re not together!  But we were holding on to each other!  How did we not jump together?!

“Brother Daniel.  You’re flock is waiting for you,” the man said with mildly disguised mockery.

“Right,” Steve muttered.  “Of couhrse they ahr,” he said in a southern drawl that he hoped sounded passable.  Apparently, it was, because the goon in front of him just looked at him sideways as he walked off to patrol.

The Reverend Saul Taylor’s Revival Tent had come to Salem in the summer of 1989, and with it came imminent threat to Marcus.  The only reason he knew it was 1989 was because that was the year that all hell broke loose with Marina.  The year he almost lost Kayla.  That memory was so bad and so overwhelming that the whole ISA undercover business had paled considerably in his memory.  As a result, he had no idea where Kayla was at this moment. 

“God bless, Brother …”

“Good evening, Brother Daniel …”

“What’s the good word, Brother …”

Saul’s followers were piling in and greeting Steve with religious contentment and joyful anticipation for an uplifting sermon from this recently saved soul.  That didn’t give Steve any time at all to dwell on the fact that that he was separated from Kayla.  He looked around him with worry and fear, forgetting, not caring, or both that he had a cover he was blowing.  Where did you jump to, Sweetness?  Where are you, baby?  He had to get home.  He had to get out of there and get to the house.  She had to be there.

Steve started rocking back and forth on his heels.  “Good evenin’, uh … brothehrs,” he said to them absently, “and, uh …”

“Daniel?” Faith Taylor said softly.

“… and sistehrs …”

“Daniel, don’t worry,” she whispered.  “I told you, it’s going to work.”

Steve dug deep for her name.  “F-Faith?”

“Yes?”

“N-nothing … nothin’, I mean.  Uh … what’s gonna work, now?” he asked with as much airy Georgia lilt as he could muster.

“Just wait till their heads are bowed, and I’ll keep them busy with the hymns.  Then you can sneak out and check around the camp.”

“Right, of couhrse,” he said with trepidation he couldn’t hide.

Faith was somewhat alarmed at Daniel’s very sudden change in demeanor.  “I can still count on you, can’t I, Danny?  You’re acting a little – a little strange.”

Was he really going to have to say a sermon?!  There was no doubt in Steve’s mind that he was not going to be able to pull that off.  “I’m fine, Faith,” he assured her. 

“You’re sure?  You’re going to be able to sneak out?”

“I promise, you can count on me.”  For what, he still had no idea.

It was a long ride in the back of the van from Salem to Saul’s retreat in the woods, and Kayla had jumped into her body at the tail end of the ride.  She still didn’t know where or when this was, but she’d at least figured out that she was in the back of a van and that she probably wasn’t a prisoner because she wasn’t tied up.  But she had no light, no real visual cues as to when she was, and no one there to tell her.  If she’d had more time to think about it, she’d have worked out where and when she was.  But she was distraught and not thinking clearly.  She didn’t check to see what she was wearing or the style of her hair. She couldn’t very well open the back doors of the moving vehicle, and there was no access to the front seat.  Instead, she felt around for what these boxes might have inside them.  She managed to see the writing on the side of one of them that said “gauze,” so she thought they could have been from the Emergency Center or the hospital.  But her heart wasn’t in it, she just wanted her husband, he wasn’t here, and she had no idea where she was being taken in this van.  So, Kayla curled up into a ball on her side and named the bones of the human body to try to keep herself from losing it.  “Steve,” she said between the tibia and fibula, “where are you?  Please come find me!”

“I have only a, uh – a brief sermon tonight.”  Steve stood at the back of the tent with ten or so pairs of eyes on him looking for a preaching of the gospel.  He knew this was right about when Saul had begun to doubt him and that Kayla was going to show up soon, but he didn’t think this was the night, and he sure as hell had no idea where he was supposed to be going when Faith played interference for him, nor what he was supposed to be looking for.  Add to that the fact that he felt completely naked without his patch.  He could feel the air blow over the eyelid that Marcus had expertly crafted for him and felt both conspicuous at its exposure while also anxious to see his face whole again.  He really wasn’t ready for people to be looking at him, so the quicker he could get off this figurative pulpit the better.

“And that sermon is about the dangehr and the evil that lurks about.”  Seemed as good as anything else.  “Dangehr needs no long discussion.  You need only to know that it is thehre, brothehrs and sistehrs.  It is here, it is thehre, and it is everywhehre.”  Paul McCartney never seemed to let him down.  “We simply must place our trust in the Lord and let him protect us.”

“Amen, brother!” the faithful hollered.  “Praise be the Lord!”

“Yes, praise be,” Steve took and ran with as he added a hallelujah, a blessed be, and another praise the Lord.  It lasted all of 90 seconds, and that was all he could stand up there in front of them all.  “Now let us bow our heads in silent prayher and ask God for protection from evil.”

Steve looked at Faith, who came down the short aisle with hands clasped in prayer.  “And now, brothers and sisters, let us keep our heads bowed in silent prayer as we sing Praise unto the Lord,” she seamlessly took over.

Steve took his cue and exited the tent as Faith began singing.

Rock of ages, cleft for me … let me hide myself in thee; let the water and the blood, from thy wounded side which flowed …

Steve stopped in his tracks at the sound of the hymn.  “The van!”  It was like a memory downloaded.  One minute he was thrust onto a live stage where he didn’t know his lines or what the play was about; the next minute he knew with burning clarity exactly where Kayla was and how he was going to get to her.  He wasn’t sure where they were going to go once he found her, but he was dead certain of exactly where she was.  “Thank you, Faith!” he whispered as he realized it was the song that triggered his sudden awakening of purpose.  He wasted no time as he headed the 20 or so feet from the tent to where the van was sitting with Kayla inside it.  “Right on cue,” he whispered.

As he climbed in, he was practically jumping out of his skin in anticipation, frantic to get her hands solidly around him.  Closing the door behind him, he hoped that was her laying very still under a tarp and that she hadn’t already run out. 

“Baby!” he cried as he pawed at the tarp, feeling her unmistakable form.  Relief washed over him.  “Kayla, it’s me!  Come out of there, baby!”

“Steve?!” she cried as she pushed the tarp over her head upon hearing his voice.

When Steve saw her he was overjoyed and just needed to hold her. Kayla on the other hand was in shock.  It had been so long since that short period of time when he had two eyes instead of the patch that had etched itself into her memory of his handsome face, that she froze.  And it wasn’t just the glass eye, it was the hair several shades whiter blonde than his natural dark golden color.  He just looked completely different. 

Steve saw the astonishment in her eyes.  “It’s me, baby,” he said with the door open a crack for light.  Kayla.  Sweetness, it’s me!  The ISA mission for—Marcus.  Reverend Taylor?”  He gathered her up in his arms and kissed her everywhere.  Her cheeks, her forehead, her lips, the top of her head, waiting for her to say something.  “Kayla!” he held her shoulders tightly as he looked her in the eye. 

She reached her hand up and touched his left cheek where his scar had once been.  Then his hair fell over his forehead in an unkempt mop.  That shook Kayla out of her stunned silence.  Her eyes quickly misted over as she held her arms out to her husband.  “Thank God you found me,” she whispered.

“Oh, Kayla!” Steve breathed out heavily in relief as he fell into her waiting arms.  “I don’t know what I would have done if I hadn’t.”

In answer Kayla began to sob into hysterics.

“No, baby, don’t cry, now.  I’ve got you,” he said as he shifted to do the holding.  “Come here.”

“Steve,” she cried into his chest as he held her next to him, “I jumped alone!  We were separated, and I didn’t kn-kn-know where you w-w-w-were.” 

Steve wanted to cry with his wife, she was so beside herself. He had to calm her down.  “Listen baby, you have to stop crying, now,” he choked out, “you’re gonna make yourself hyperventilate, here.”

“I-I-I …”

“Too late, I think.”

Kayla nodded and tried to stop crying.  He held her to his chest, and he felt different, but the same.  His clothes were different, his body seemed bulked up and beefier, and he smelled like the outdoors of the Retreat, but he was unmistakably hers, and all she wanted to do was melt into his arms and let him hide her away from the reality of what just happened.

“Shhh … Sweetness, you have to calm down, because we’ve got to get out of here before they drive off with us.”

Just then, a guard named Larry came and closed the door to the van, shuttering them in darkness.  Kayla stopped her crying on a dime for fear of being found.

After a moment, the front door slammed shut and the engine roared to life.  “Shit,” Steve cursed.

Kayla sniffed and inhaled deeply as her breathing started to right itself.  She remembered a little better than Steve did that this did not end as she’d hoped the first time around.  Steve had been captured, and she’d walked all the way back to Salem in search of help.

“This isn’t good, Sweetness.”

“We’re in trouble aren’t we?” she asked, already knowing the answer.

“Yep.”

Chapter Text

Find Me
Chapter 21

Steve’s head was swimming.  He just didn’t remember the events of his time on this mission as well as other events in his past and, therefore, wasn’t sure exactly how this went the first time.  Was this where he found Shane or was this when he found the secret room?  It was a miracle he remembered where she was at all.

Kayla, on the other hand, had gone from hysterics to very focused and knew exactly what was coming.  She could feel the anxiety radiating through Steve as he held her tightly to him, and she knew she had to take charge of this one. 

“Steve,” she said, wiping the tears from her face.  “They’re going to find you.  Remember last time, you found the cave, and then I watched them tie you up?  Do you remember?  You made me go back to Salem and get the ISA.”

“I remember,” he replied, looking around.  “Kind of.”

“Kind of?”  The van was driving at a slow rate of speed now, and Steve knew it wasn’t going to be a long trip.

“I remember, Kayla, it’s just … fuzzy.  I remember you snuck here from the Emergency Center, we found the electronics, and then we got into trouble when the van stopped.  Is that when they tied me up?

“Yes.  It took me all night to walk back to Salem, I was a mess.”

“What?  You never told me that!”

Steve was still holding her tightly to his chest, and Kayla held on just as tightly.  She couldn’t see his face any longer, but knowing it was there, she wanted so badly to see it.  “I guess there wasn’t any point.  By the time I finally found you everything was a mess and then the cave blew up, and you went to Washington right after that.” 

Steve didn’t say anything, but Kayla could feel him tense up.  It was the mention of that DC trip.  It was at the airport on the way to DC that everything started to unravel, when Marina had made her presence known.  He hated this time in his life and wished it had stayed buried when all his other memories came back to him.  Nothing would be the same after Marina’s intrusion into their lives, and he couldn’t help but add this to the list of things his mind was reeling from now.  This face, the goons, almost losing Kayla after Marina’s return, and most of all, the fact that they jumped apart.  It was getting to him.

“God, Kayla, what happened on this jump?  I thought the worst when I realized you weren’t with me.”

“Me, too,” she said reaching for his hand and closing her eyes to the feel of him under her cheek. 

Steve sighed deeply.  “Right now we just have to get out of here and think about the jump later.”

Kayla couldn’t help it, she was still feeling the panic from her solo arrival.  “We have to stay together, though.  If you get tied up, we’re going to be separated for days.”

“Baby, I’m not letting you out of my sight.” 

“Promise me, Steve.  I forget how long it took, but it seemed like forever before I got back here.  Then they put me in the cave, and you got me out.” 

“Yeah, that I remember, Shane got me in there.”

“… right …”

“They had him holed up in a trailer somewhere, baby.   He was in bad shape,” he remembered.   It was like a movie you haven’t seen in a long time; he had the plot down, but the details were a blur.  “Have I found him yet?”

Kayla wanted off the subject of Shane.  “It doesn’t matter, we have to get out of here before they tie you up.  We can’t let them separate us.”

Just then the van slowed as they’d arrived at the secret cave that was built into the side of the mountain.  Steve was torn.  The point of this mission was to save Marcus.  Which he did, because he and Shane had exposed the drug ring, so the threat from what Marcus saw as a boy in Cleaver was eliminated.  If he ran away now, that wasn’t going to happen, and he was sure they’d find Marcus and kill him.  So part of him felt a duty to stay.  But the fact that they’d jumped apart was bad, and he was more worried about that than anything else.  He knew they had to run, find somewhere safe to stay, and try to figure out what to do before they jumped again.  Besides, nothing they did here was going to matter, anyway, as it would reset the minute they jumped.

So, why was he feeling so conflicted?

The van stopped, and the two guards, got out with a slam of the front doors.

“They’re coming,” Kayla squeaked

“– Shh!”  He covered them both with the tarp and waited for the doors to open.  After a few moments when no one opened the doors, they came back out.

Steve went for the door handle.  “Stay here.”

“No wait!” She was not about to let him check things out by himself.

Steve cracked open the door and saw that Kayla’s beautiful face meant business.  He looked back at her with serious resolve of his own and repeated sternly, “Stay. Here.”  Then he opened the door and hopped out.  Steve slowly peered around to the front of the van to see one of the guards being let into the secret cave and suddenly remembered that the other guard was lurking nearby.  In that moment, he felt an overwhelming sense of purpose and knew they weren’t going to get another chance to get out of there.  “Alright, let’s go,” he whispered as he helped her out of the van.  Then without another word, Steve grabbed Kayla tightly by the hand and, to her utter relief, started off through the woods toward the main road.

Kayla’s adrenalin was pumping, and her legs just wanted to run.  She didn’t care where.  And for about 30 minutes, that’s exactly what they did, sticking to the thickets of the forest to avoid detection.  Unfortunately, Kayla’s shoes were not made for walking, and this slowed them down.  Still, she held her own as they ducked under branches, climbed over logs, and sprinted the short distances through clearings.  They ran in relative silence, neither of them knowing exactly where they were going but simply headed away from the Retreat grounds.  Steve asked her if she was doing ok every now and then, to which she always assured him that she was; Kayla stole several glances at Steve’s face, which he pretended not to notice even as it made his heart race.  

After walking for about an hour with no sign of any pursuers, Steve felt like it was safe enough to take a break.  “Sweetness, we need to rest, come here, let’s sit.”

He pulled her down to the ground with him as they leaned against a small outcropping of rock. They were breathing hard and sweating in the hot summer weather, and she was so grateful for the break.   Kayla turned to look at him, but he turned her away so that he could hold her as she leaned back against him.  She leaned her head back onto his shoulder and closed her eyes in sadness.  He didn’t want her to see him, and she didn’t know why.  She reached her hand up behind her to touch his cheek, and he grabbed it, bringing her fingertips to his lips to kiss them.

“Steve—“

“Baby, we’ve got to find somewhere to get some water or we’re gonna pass out here.”

She sat back up and turned to face him.  Steve immediately looked toward the ground.  Very gently, she took his face in both of her hands and slowly leaned it up to face her. When he finally looked her in the eye, she saw apprehension there.  But she looked so intently upon his ruggedly sculpted features shining in the moonlight.  She’d only seen this face for such a brief time back then, and she was fascinated as she took him in.  He looked so different.  “But still my husband,” she said, finishing the thought out loud.

“Kayla, what the hell is that supposed to mean?” he snapped at her.

Kayla pulled back her hands as if he’d just slapped them away and raised her hurt-filled eyes to him.  “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean anything by it.  You just look –“

“I know how I look,” he said, his agitation building. 

“—beautiful,” she whispered.  “You look beautiful.” 

Steve felt lost as he looked at her with melancholy.  He didn’t like this time they’d jumped to and wanted to get out of it.  The whole mission he remembered only through a haze, this face his wife didn’t know, and the fact that they jumped here apart had him in a bad way.  Now he was snapping at her for no reason, and it made him feel worse. 

“I’m sorry, Sweetness,” he said in a softer tone.  “I don’t know why I did that.  This jump is getting to me.”

Kayla took his hand and kissed the corner of his new eye.  “All you need to know is that I love you, Steve.  In any face, I love you.”

“You’ll get the old one back soon enough,” he said with contempt. 

Kayla didn’t know this face as well, but she knew what she saw in her husband’s eye, and it gave her cause for alarm.  Why did he sound like this?  She wasn’t sure if he meant because of the events that re-damaged it or because they would eventually jump.  “I don’t care what face you have.  It doesn’t matter,” she said, the worry beginning to reach her eyes. 

Steve nodded.  “I know, baby.  I know you’ll take me no matter which face you get.  This jump just threw me is all.  I’m – I’m not myself.”  Why aren’t I myself? Why am I acting this way?

Steve reached his hand up to feel where his patch used to be and chuckled.  “Didn’t we just talk about being ready for whatever bodies we get?  Guess I didn’t take my own advice very well.  It’s …” he turned his face away “… hard to adjust.” 

Kayla palmed his cheek, and he turned into her, placing a kiss there.

“I really love you,” he whispered, trying to shake it off.

“I love you, too.” 

They rested there for a few minutes, and Kayla took off her pumps and rubbed her feet.  “Do you think we’re far enough?” she asked.

“Yeah, I think we’re safe now.  But I left a mess back at that camp, Faith is waiting for me to come back from a scouting mission of some kind.  She’s gonna think I abandoned her.”  After a beat Steve realized the irony.  “I did abandon her, and Marcus, too.  Plus Shane needs saving out there.”

Kayla quickly changed the subject.  “Steve, we’ve never had a jump like this.  Separated.  We were even holding hands when it happened.  Why do you think we didn’t jump together?”

“I don’t know, but I’ve got a bad feeling about this.  I was completely caught off guard, here, Kayla.  I almost blew it out there, I had no idea where I was.  And worse, when I finally realized I was at the Retreat, I couldn’t think of where you were.  How am I supposed to find you if I we get separated again?”

Kayla started to rock back and forth, something she only did when she was exceedingly worried.  Steve could see the gears turning in her head.

“I think we need to go over our, I don’t know, our lives, maybe,” she said.  “Where we are in which years.”

“What? Kayla, how are we supposed to do that?”

“I think we have to.  How will we find each other if this happens again?”

Steve plowed his hand through is hair and rubbed his left eyebrow.  That’s when he noticed the path.  It wasn’t obvious, but it was there not five feet from where they were sitting.  A discarded PowerBar wrapper glinted in the moonlight, telling him that this was a path people used recently, maybe for hikers. 

“Sweetness, I think we’ve found our way to water.”  He pointed out the path and got them both up. 

By now Kayla was never going to get her swollen feet back into the pumps and followed barefoot behind Steve down the worn path.   Soon they came to what could only be described as something out of the 1800’s.  Ten or so little log cabins, each one complete with barrels and water pumps. 

“What’s all this?” Steve asked.

Kayla knew exactly what this was.  “It’s the Pioneer Village!” 

“The what, now?”

“The Pioneer Village,” she repeated with excited, wide eyes as she grinned like the schoolgirl she was last she saw this place.  “We used to take a field trip here every year in grammar school.  It’s a real working village with candle-making and weaving, and you can buy candy bars in the gift shop, so we can eat something!  I had no idea this is where it was!”

There was something about candle-making and weaving and candy bars in a gift shop that struck Steve funny, and he let out peals of laughter that he just couldn’t help. 

“What’s so funny?” she asked with relief as she watched her husband’s new old face light up. 

“I get a vision of you in a prairie dress dipping candles and eating a Snickers, baby.  It’s cute.”

“Oh, you like that vision, do ya?” she said as she crossed her arms in mock offense.  “I’m cute?”

Steve took his wife in his arms and looked her in the eye as he continued to laugh. She looked angelic in the moonlight.  Innocent in her smile.  He took a mental picture of her and filed it away.  “Yeah,” he replied meaningfully.  “You’re very cute.”

Kayla wrapped her arms around his neck, leaned her head up toward his, and kissed him deeply.  He accepted her kiss gratefully and held her.  Then Kayla pulled away gently and refocused.  “We can definitely get water down there,” she said sounding eager but all grown up again, “those pumps really work.  Come on.” 

“Wait,” he grabbed her arm, “is anyone down there?”

“Not at night, they don’t actually live here.  It’s just a day thing.  I think.”

He looked over his shoulder and just prayed no one had caught up with them.  “Ok, lead the way, Sweetness.”

They tried four of the cabins before they got lucky with an unlocked window.  Steve admired the craftsmanship of its old style as Kayla climbed through it.  Then he felt uneasy again when she disappeared inside the cabin to open the door for him. 

“Thank god, this one has a bathroom,” she greeted him, “I’ve had to pee since before we got off that van.”

“Since when do pioneers have bathrooms?” he jibed.  Kayla laughed.  He always knew how to make everyone laugh.

When she was done, Steve took his turn, then they went out to the well and filled a couple bowls up with water.  This must have been one of the homestead cabins, as it had all the amenities of a one-room house, 20^th century bathroom, notwithstanding.  After she drank the water, Kayla found a towel and began washing the dirt path off her feet. 

“Here, hand that over, Sweetness,” Steve said as she gave him the towel.  He then moved her chair so it was facing the bed.  He sat down opposite her and pushed her black pants up before he took over with her feet, rinsing the dirt off of them.  He knew she wanted to look at his face, and he thought letting her do that might help him get over the shock of himself, too, and shake him out of this unsettled mood.

And that’s exactly what she did.  She couldn’t take her eyes off her husband.  The memories of that time came back to her … seeing him for the first time as a homeless man, the shock of seeing this person who looked nothing like Steve but who most certainly was, feeling her hand in his for the first time in days when she gave him Emily and Gideon’s bible, kissing him though the fence that first time she’d snuck up to the retreat to see him.  She loved him so much.  That love smoldered through her eyes, sending a thrill through Steve as he watched her watching him while he soothed her feet.  It was an intimate act that made them feel so close to each other on this unstable, bizarre jump.

“Mmm, this feels good.  Thank you.” 

“You’re welcome, Sweetness.” 

When he was done he kept her feet in his lap and caressed the tops of them gently.  But his unease continued; nothing here felt right.  It wasn’t just this face that didn’t seem to belong in his life with Kayla, it was what that face reminded him of.  He’d left people behind back there where he was undercover as Daniel Lucas.  There was no question that he had to run when they did, but was he supposed to just not follow through with any of it?  And what if they get separated again?  All this went through his head with tremendous uncertainty as to what they were supposed to do next.  He pushed it away and decided somewhere that if he kept busy it would go away. 

“You’re right, Kayla. We have to talk about where we …” he didn’t know what to call it.  “Where we’ve been.  Where we’ve lived.”  Now he had worked his way up from her feet and was rubbing her ankle, working toward her leg. “We got lucky this time.  But we need to know how to find each other.”

“You found me, Steve.”

“You came to me, Sweetness.  But next time we might not get so lucky.”

Steve’s ministrations on her leg felt so good, she could fall asleep right here.  “Where do we begin?” she asked sleepily, still gazing at him.

“Well,” he sighed, “I met you in 1986,” he said.  Maybe we should start there.”

Then Kayla had a thought that made her heart skip a beat.  “What … what if we jump somewhere before that?  Before we knew each other?”

This was daunting.  He didn’t know how they were going to get through it all before they invariably jumped again, but he knew they had to try. 

“Baby, we’ve got to start somewhere, so let’s just start with us as an us, then worry about before that after.”  The amount of crazy in that statement wasn’t lost on either of them, and they took a moment to allow themselves to laugh.  “Ok, Sweetness, well, we both know that the first time I saw you I was in your closet in Cleveland.  You were working for the doctor that stole Kim’s baby.”

“Right.  You lived under Shenanigans.”

“And I worked at the docks with your brother.”

“Ok, so then what?  I moved to Salem, right?  I was in the loft for a long time.”

“Yeah, but, you lived at the Deveraux estate for some of that.  We have to get detailed, take mental notes.”

The prospect of doing this seemed so impossible that Kayla couldn’t do it right now.  She looked over at her clearly drained husband and decided that he couldn’t either. She swung her legs down to the floor and sat at the edge of the bed.  “When was the last time you slept?” 

Steve really was mentally exhausted, he couldn’t remember when the last time he slept was.  “But, Kayla, we have to go over this stuff.”

“Ok, we will.  After you sleep.”

“Will they find us here in the morning?”

“I’ll stay awake and make sure to wake you before that happens.”

“Sweetness, no, what if we jump?”

“So, what, we’re supposed to live like insomniacs now?  We’re human, we have to sleep.  I’ve done that twice.  Now, come on, you took care of me, now let me take care of you.  Sleep.”  She stood up then pulled him up and pushed on his rear till he landed on the bed face first.

“Ooh, baby, I like it when you get pushy, now.” 

Kayla laughed.  Never too tired to flirt with her.  “Yeah, well, let’s build up that stamina first.”

Steve pulled her down on top of him.  “Lay with me while I sleep,” he said.  And as he looked into her beautiful eyes, his worry and uneasiness about this entire jump returned stronger than he’d ever felt it. His heart started to pound, and his expression became fraught in a blink as he gripped her. 

Kayla saw that something had suddenly changed.  Something was definitely wrong.  And although they were being playful just a moment ago, she knew that look.  She’d seen it only one other time.

“Steve?  Do you remember when we conceived Stephanie?”  Steve couldn’t remember each individual time they made love, but that’s a night he definitely remembered.  They’d just gotten back from Reverend Taylor’s funeral, and he was out of his mind with worry that Marina was alive and going to ruin his marriage – that Kayla would leave him.  He couldn’t tell her the truth when she asked him what was wrong.  All he could do to share himself with his wife that night was to make love to her like a thirsty man in a desert.  With possession and gratitude and fear and devotion and all the love he had for her for the terror that she might leave him. 

“I remember,” he said softly.

“The look on your face when you made love to me that night is the same look you’re giving me right now.”

Marina is coming.

Steve shot up off the bed; as the words ran through his head he started to pace.  Kayla watched him do this with renewed alarm. 

Steve didn’t look away this time.  He turned toward his wife and let his nervous eye bore a hole through her.  If they stayed on this jump long enough, Marina was going to show up, and that was one of the last places he wanted to go again.  There was no time in their lives that Steve hated more than the time the not-so-dead first wife that he’d hidden from Kayla had come back to cause them the worst kind of problems.  He and Kayla weren’t going to have a moment to just enjoy each other with this new face of his before that whole mess came to their doorstep.  This wasn’t a face that came with good things for his wife.  And as he remembered that horrible fear he’d lived with for weeks back then that he was going to lose Kayla, he realized that it was the same fear he was feeling right now that he’d lose her on one of these jumps.  And that’s what caused the look Kayla saw on his face.

All this went through Steve’s mind in a single moment as he looked at her with this building storm behind his eyes. 

“Steve, what’s wrong?!” She stood up and went to her husband.  Kayla was truly worried now.”

The intensity of his gaze turned frantic as she approached him.  He had to keep her with him, hold on to her.  He had to be with her, touch her, surround her.   Like he did that night they conceived Stephanie.  It wasn’t sexual so much as it was desperate.  He loved her, he wanted her, he was terrified of ending up on another jump without her and losing track of her.  What about when you were a soldier?  And her losing track of him.  He grabbed his wife and clutched her tightly to him as a strangled sound escaped his throat.

“What is it?” she asked from his grip.  “Please tell me, Steve, you’re scaring me!”

“Where were you before when I was begging you to talk to me?”  He remembered her words on the front porch of their home that warm September night like hot lashes burning his skin. 

“Kayla, I – I don’t want to lie to you.”

“Lie to me?” she asked incredulously.  She didn’t like where this was going at all.  “About what?”  Steve had a hard time saying the woman’s name.  “Tell me, Steve, please.”  Tears started to pool in her eyes.

“Marina.”

“Marina?” Kayla bristled as she squirmed out of his grasp.  Seeing her reaction only intensified what Steve was already feeling.  “What’s she got to do with any of this?”

Steve took her hands back in his. He had to be touching her.  “If we stay here long enough, we’re going to run into her, Kayla, it’s only a matter of days now.” Steve’s fear started to mix with rage.”  Remember when I went to DC for this debrief on that Colonel Whatshisname?  It all started in the airport.  That’s where she showed up and started her shit.  Don’t you see, baby?  We don’t have much time before she comes back to ruin our lives,” he yelled.  Kayla was silent for a moment while she tried to dial down her stress.  “Baby, it’s comin’ back to me, I’m relivin’ it, here!”  He put his hand up to where his patch used to be. 

“No,” Kayla cut him off.  “Don’t do this to us, to yourself.  We’re not going to be here long enough to really see her.  We’ve already done this once, so we know what to do about her, now.  Right now, here, we just have to worry about staying together in this.”

“This face didn’t do right by you, Kayla.”  There, he said it.

Kayla finally understood.  “That was a long time ago,” she said quietly.  She didn’t say it wasn’t true, because it was.  But she’d forgiven him years ago and didn’t want to revisit this.  “We can do things differently this time if we’re really still here by then.” Stephanie, she thought as a chill ran down her spine.  We have to make sure we make Stephanie.

“I’m afraid,” Steve said.  There was no point in hiding it.

“I am, too,” she said softly.  Kayla kissed Steve’s left eye, then his cheek tenderly.  Then she joined her lips with his and tried to replace the pain he was feeling with her love for him.

As he returned her kiss, his need for her doubled.  He walked them over to the bed without breaking away from her lips.  He lowered her down on her back, and crawled on top of her. 

“I need you, Kayla,” he said as he wrapped his leg around her like he did that night.  “I need to feel you in my arms.  I need to be in yours.”

As he kissed her hungrily, she reveled in the feel of him surrounding her.  He pulled back from their kiss, and Kayla watched him rake not one eye but two over her like he wanted to possess her. And that’s exactly what she wanted, too.

Steve’s penis had hardened to steel beneath his pants.  Kayla felt it rigid against her leg and began rubbing against it gently.  Steve responded by centering himself above her and grinding against his wife’s sensitive folds while still embracing her entire body in his arms and legs.  He was insane with his need for her, to hold on to her, too afraid to let her go or to stop.  “I need to hear you come, Kayla.  Baby … I need you to hear me scream your name.”

Steve rocked back and forth on her with measured strokes that found their mark on her swollen clitoris even though the thin layer of her pants.  As he fought his fears that she’d leave him, Kayla longed to feel his naked length inside of her.  She needed him now just as much as he needed her.  “Steve!” she whimpered loudly, “I love you.”  Steve responded by capturing her mouth in a tongue-filled kiss that only threw more fuel on the fire. 

Kayla was close to the edge.  It wasn’t only what his hardness was doing to her, it was also the look on his face as he watched her build in her ecstasy.   “That time you made love to me with this look on your face,” she gasped as she reached up to touch him, “was one of the last times you made love to me with this beautiful face.”  She could feel her orgasm just out of reach, but so close.

“That night, baby,” he replied still grinding against her, “I thought you were going to leave me.”  He wanted to be inside her, but he couldn’t stop rocking his cock against her core long enough to get their clothes off.  He let one hand go of her long enough to reach down to feel her wetness through her pants, and it sent him into a frenzy.

“Never, Steve!  I’ll never leave you.”  She groaned at the edge of release.  “Don’t stop, Steve. Please don’t stop!”

“Tell this face what you want, baby.  Tell me.”

Kayla moaned.  “I want you inside me!”

It was too late, he was moments from exploding.  “I can’t … I’m almost—“

“Then I want you to feel you harder,” she whispered.  And yell my name.  I’m, oh … I’m … say my name.”

“Look at me, Kayla. This face is only for you, Sweetness – I’m coming!”  He never looked away from her as he moaned her name loudly over and over while his orgasm released.  “Kayla!  Sweetness … Kayla!”  He loved her so much, and even as he felt so good in his release, guilt washed over him; he wished he’d been inside her. 

When the last of the white streams hindered by the shield of his clothing subsided, Kayla stopped bucking against him.  He still hadn’t taken his eyes off of her.  “Your turn.”

It only took three hard thrusts across her sensitive core to put her over the edge.  “Please say my name, Kayla.  Please tell me you love me,” his voice broke.

“I do, Steve, oh …  Steve, I do love you. Are you watching?

“I’m watching, Sweetness.”

Good, she panted as he saw the waves of pleasure wash over his wife.  She’d wanted to feel his rock hard erection slide in and out of her; it had been so long.  She threw her head back on the bed with the power of her orgasm, then looked right at him and said, “You’re mine, Steven Earl Johnson.”  She shuddered in his arms.  “Your face, any … face … is the face I Iove … forever.”

He held her tightly until her body had stopped trembling, never once looking away from her. 

It was the first time they’d had any sort of sexual release since these jumps had begun.  He knew what came over him and felt guilty about it.  He just had to have her and couldn’t stop long enough to truly make love to her.  “I’m sorry,” he said.

“For what, baby?” she asked softly.

“For being selfish.  For taking you this way.  Roughly, quickly.”

Kayla put a finger to his lips and shook her head.  “No,” she said.

“I think it was talking about that night we made love at home, when we conceived Stephanie.  I remember it so well, Kayla. I remember so little about where we are on this jump on this assignment, but I remember everything about that horrible time right after. We didn’t have any time to be together this way, because I almost ruined us.”  He was still on top of her, holding her tightly.  “Making love to you that night was the desperate act of a man trying to hold on.  I thought I was going to lose you.  I felt the same way tonight,” he said with guilt in his voice.  “Like I might lose you on one of these jumps, and I had to … have you.  I should have made love to you properly, Kayla.”

“Steve,” she whispered and caressed his face with the pads of her thumbs.  She looked up at him with such gentle, blue eyes.

“But, you were so beautiful, having an orgasm in my arms.”  Thank you for giving that to me tonight. And thank you for giving me my beautiful daughter all those years ago.  I take, and you just love me so much that you keep giving.”

“We gave her to each other, Steve.  And we gave tonight to each other, too.”  Steve finally took his eyes off his wife as he closed them and nodded.  “Baby, please sleep now, ok?”  She fought not to cry.  He wouldn’t sleep if she cried.  “Can you do that for me?” she asked.

“Next time we’ll really make love.”

Kayla was hurting for her husband.  He was so distraught.  She just wanted him to sleep this nightmare away.  “Please, Steve, my love.  Please sleep.”

“Will we be here in the morning?” he asked as he finally rolled off of her onto his side, embracing her in front of him in their favorite position.

“Yes, we will.”

“How do you know?”

“I just do,” she lied.

“How do you know?” he asked again, as the last tendrils of wakefulness unraveled their hold on him.

“Because,” she cried, “in my darkest hour, and in my coldest silence, I looked for you … and you were there.  You’re always there.  You always will be.”

“Don’t leave me, Sweetness.” It was the last thing he said before sleep finally took him.

“Never,” she promised.  Then she fell asleep in his arms, praying that they’d be there together when they woke up.

Chapter Text

Find Me
Chapter 22

Steve’s eyes were open, but he couldn’t see through the fog of the bay.  He held out his hand at arm’s length but could barely make out the outline of it in front of his face.  He wasn’t sure what he was doing there and realized that he must have jumped while he was sleeping.  He didn’t know where he’d jumped to or when, but he could tell he was on a boat.  Right away he reached for Kayla, but she wasn’t there. 

“Kayla?” he called out into the inky night.  “Kayla!”  His words were dampened by the water and shroud of fog that surrounded him.  He ran the short length of the stern quickly back and forth to try to find her, but the smooth, clean deck beneath his feet gave no hint as to her whereabouts.  He’d jumped alone again.  Why!  Why again!  “Kayla, no!  Where are you?!”  

A small, barely there voice said, “here” from somewhere behind him.  Steve turned on his heel and hurried toward the voice straight into her waiting arms that seemed to float toward him in the fog.  “Baby!” he said as he buried his face in her hair and let those arms hold him tight.

“I’m back.  I’m here,” she whispered.

But Steve immediately felt something was wrong.  Her body was wrong.  She was holding him wrong. She smelled wrong.  And Steve knew this whole thing was wrong.  He grabbed her shoulders and held her back to look at her, and the eyes looking back at him were not those of his wife, but those of Marina.

Steve shoved her hard against the cabin wall and fell backward onto the cool hard surface of the deck.  “Where’s my wife?!” Steve spat up at her.

“I’m right here, Steve,” Marina replied in the voice that he hadn’t heard in 20 years.  “Can’t you see me, my darling?”

“I’m not your darling, and you’re not my wife!  Where is Kayla?  What did you do to her?”

“Kayla is not your wife, Steven, I am.  I’m the one you left for dead in that cold water below.”

“And you should have stayed dead, you bitch!  Why couldn’t you just stay dead?  Why did you have to come back and ruin my life! I barely had a year left, and you took, so much of it away from me!”  With every step Marina took toward him Steve had inched back toward the end of the boat.  Now he looked up at her with his back against the wall and felt sick.”

“Don’t you miss me, Steven?  Don’t you miss making love to me?”

“That wasn’t love, that was a boy getting his rocks off.  That’s all you were to me!  A woman I fucked.  Less than nothin’!”

“Why do you want to hurt me, Steven, when I know what makes you happy?” She reached down to touch his lips with her forefinger, and Steve wrenched his head away from her, pulling himself up to face her.  Then he pushed her away from him skimming her breast with his hand on its way to the push. 

“Oooh, that felt good, Steven, I want you to touch me.”

“Well, I don’t wanna touch you.  I want my wife.”

“I am your wife.”

“You were never my wife, you were my biggest mistake, that’s what you were.”

“I made you feel good all day long, Steven,” she said in a seductive voice, “that wasn’t a mistake.”  Then Marina reached her hand toward Steve’s crotch, but he caught it before she could touch him and bent it back in an unnatural position.

Marina screamed in pain.  “You’re hurting me!  You’re going to break my wrist!”

“GOOD!  I WANT IT TO BREAK!”  He heard a crack and watched as Marina howled in pain.  Then he seized her long, slender neck in a crushing hold and saw her eyes begin to bulge.  “You were dead, and you should have stayed dead,” he said in a menacing whisper, “but you had to come back and ruin my life.”  He leaned her backwards over the back of the boat. “Right in this goddamned bay, Marina,” he spat.  “Then you died again, and I only wish your sister hadn’t of beaten me to it.”

“I’m your lover, Steven,” she choked. “You love me!”

“I never loved you!” He was in an uncontrollable rage.  “Now when I kill you, you’d better fucking stay dead this time!”  Steve squeezed as hard as he could, and a strangled gasp came out of the woman in his arms.  Only that woman was no longer Marina.  He was now squeezing the beautiful alabaster neck of his wife.  

“Ste—“ Kayla choked.

“Baby?!” Steve gasped in horror.  “No!”  Steve jerked her up and released her neck as they collapsed together on the deck.  “Sweetness, I’m sorry!” he caressed her hair and her face with the shaking hand that tried to strangle her as she laid across his lap.  “I thought you were Marina!”

Kayla looked back at him with dying eyes that loved him as she gasped for her last breaths.  She was beautiful.  Her short blonde hair, older face, and the scar peeking out from her white nightgown told him this was his Kayla.  God, how he wanted to go home.  With his wife.  To his time.  To his family.  How did she get here?  He was so confused. And now he was killing her.

“Kayla, I’m sorry,” he started to sob.  “I’m sorry!”  He was so dizzy, he had to jump.  They had to get out and jump before she died.  “I love you, Sweetness.  I love you, please forgive me!  Please baby!  I’m sorry, I’m so sorry!”  He was losing her fast as he rocked her in his arms.  “Forgive me, Sweetness, please forgive me!”

“Steve,” she said to him.

“I’m sorry, baby, I love you.  Don’t leave me!”

“Steve!  Nooo, no, no, no, no, baby, I’m here, wake up!”

Kayla was shaking her husband, trying to rouse him from the throes of a dream that was so bad he was flailing.

“Jump us!”

“STEVE!”

Steve’s eyes snapped open and immediately fell on the young face of his wife in 1989.  The shock of his surroundings brought him to reality at once, and he grabbed her face in his hands and turned it back and forth so he could see her neck.  He saw she was ok and let out a strangled sigh of his own.

“You’re ok,” she said firmly.  “We’re both ok.”

Steve clutched her to him and kissed her head.  Then without a word, he kissed her wrist and very gently kissed her neck.  Then he held her to him again.

“It was a dream, Steve.”

“I know.”

“Do you want to talk about it?”

“No.  I just want to go home.”

Kayla cupped the back of her husband’s head in her hand and stroked her palm up and down over his back as he held on to her in the pre-dawn shadows.  He leaned his forehead into the crook of her neck and thanked God that they were alive and that they were together.

This bed was foreign to Kayla, and she momentarily forgot where they were.  As she whispered that she loved him and that they were ok, she also registered that they were still there in the cabin of the Pioneer Village near Saul’s retreat.  She looked at her watch and saw that it was nearly 4am. 

Steve had remained silent and simply let his wife hold and whisper to him in comfort.  Now he pulled back from her and kissed her lips gently.   He saw Kayla’s eyes flicker with unconscious reaction when she saw his face again, still so new to her.

“Pretty bad, huh?” she asked.

Steve nodded.  “The worst.”

She knew he was reluctant to talk about it, and she didn’t want to push him, but the things he was saying in his sleep before she finally roused him, the clear anguish he was feeling, compelled her forward.

“You were restless all night, you know.  You were begging me to forgive you.”  The tone of her voice was so quiet.  “Kept saying you were sorry,” she whispered as she interlaced her fingers with Steve’s. 

“I said I don’t want to talk about it.”

“Please, Steve, I need you to be ok.  Let me help you.”

“I don’t wanna hurt you!”

“But you’re hurting!”

“Maybe I should hurt.”

Kayla just instinctively knew this was about Marina and everything she brought with her.  And Steve saw in her eyes that she knew.

“You still want me to talk about it?” he asked.

“Yes,” she said without hesitation.  She curled her fingers into Steve’s cheeks as if he’d had a beard there.  “Don’t shut me out again.”

It was the use of the word “again” combined with the loving touch of her fingers that made him turn the corner.

“Baby,” he sighed, “I’m haunted by her.  I dreamed I jumped … I think … and I was back on that boat in the Harbor when we were – together.  You didn’t jump with me, and she was there trying to touch me and make me say I lo … that I …”

“I know.  It’s ok.”

“I hate her, Kayla,” he seethed.  “I wanted to kill her.  It was easy for me.  She wanted to erase you, and I wanted to kill her so bad I could feel the hate inside of me.  So, I strangled her.  But then she changed, and it wasn’t her.  It was you.  You layin’ almost dead in my arms.”

Kayla took Steve’s hand and held it up to her face.

“And, Sweetness … it was you, baby,” he whispered, "not a past you.  From when I’d tried to choke you in my sleep that night.  I’d strangled you, not her.”

Steve ran his hand up over her hair and dragged some of it out of its twists as a result.  “It’s this face, baby,” he said as he pulled out her ponytail holder at the nape of her neck and started unraveling her hair.  “I don’t want to be in it.  I don’t feel like your husband in it, I feel like the man who was once … with her … and then lied to you.”  His fingers felt good in her hair as he combed through it with them, releasing her blonde tresses around her shoulders.  “Then I go and do what I did last night.”

“Steve, I loved what we did last night.  I felt so close to you.  So, we didn’t make love, I felt your love anyway.  Is it really only making love if you’re inside me?”  He gave her a look that hinted so slightly at the leer he reserved especially for her that always seemed to be in him, and she smiled.  “Ok, well, maybe it’s not quite the same, but … I felt you just the same.  Ok?”

Steve grinned slightly.  “Yeah … ok.  But baby, that dream was so real.  I’m having a hard time shaking the guilt, Sweetness.”

Kayla looked at his handsome features and let her eyes wander over to his new left eye.  It was so different.  Fascinating to look at.  She didn’t know what to say to make him feel better.  But she had to snap him out of this. 

“Steve, I’m not going to say you did the right thing.  And we can’t go back and change what happened. You can’t go back and tell me that you were once married to Marina.  That—“ this was hard, “that I wasn’t the only woman you’d ever m-marry.”  Her eyes misted over despite her best efforts, and it kicked Steve in the gut.  “And there’s a part of me that will always feel that.  But that’s life.  I forgave you.  I still forgive you!  Now, we just have to go on and live.  Just like we did the first time.  And we were so happy!  My life with you is wonderful and beautiful, even after that whole mess, we were happy!  You, me, and this baby we’re about to make.”  She patted her belly that in a matter of weeks would be carrying their daughter.  She hoped as a stab of worry coursed through her.  “Please stop blaming yourself.  Because I can’t take seeing you like this.”  She paused and kissed him softly.  “Look at me.  Do you believe that I forgive you?”

Steve looked into her eyes and knew it was true.  “I do,” he said.

“Ok,” she smiled.

He held her face in his hands and kissed her deeply.  She responded with little sounds of love and contentment, and it made his heart swell. 

“And one more thing.  This is the face you were born with, Steven Earl Johnson.  And I love it just as much as the one that I met in 1986.”  He smiled at her.  “If you’re wearing it,” she stuck her chin out and spoke with the most adorable conviction that made Steve feel so proud that she was his, “then I love it.”

“What did I do to deserve you, Sweetness?”

Kayla laughed and dragged Steve back down on the bed to snuggle against him.  She undid the buttons on his shirt and then laid her cheek on his bare chest, loving the feel of it against her skin.  Steve let her and stroked her hair.  He couldn’t say he was completely over this, and he was definitely concerned about Marina showing up if they stayed long enough.  But he allowed his guilt to wane and acknowledged that they had a serious problem they really did need to talk about.

“Kayla?”

Mm?”

“We have to talk about what’s happening to us.”

Kayla turned to look up at him.  “I’ve been trying to do that for days.”

“I know.  I just didn’t see much of a point since there didn’t seem to be anything we could do about it.  But now with this jumping apart stuff.”  He sighed.

“I know.  It was horrible.”

“Why did that happen, baby?  Did we do something?  We were together every other time.”

“Steve, I think we have to go back to why we started jumping at all.  Obviously, this isn’t normal.”

He didn’t want to argue, but he honestly didn’t understand how they could figure that out.  “Ok,” he sighed dragging a hand down over his face, “Ok, fine.  Why?  I dunno, baby, the gods are mad at us.”

Kayla had a thought as she ignored his snarky comment.  She sat up and sat on the bed cross-legged facing him.  “Come on, let’s talk about this.  Come on,” she prodded.  Steve did as she asked and sat up to lean against the wrought-iron headboard.  “Steve what did we do the night we jumped?  Let’s go over everything we did.”

Steve raised his eyebrows and grinned like the Cheshire Cat.  “The earth moved that night, baby, that I remember.”

Kayla smiled back at him and bit her bottom lip.  “Yes, it did, didn’t it?”

“Nothin’ but net, baby.”

“Ok, really, though, if we retrace our steps that day, maybe we can figure out what is … out of place.”

“Nothin’ was out of place, Sweetness, it was a regular day, same as all those days we’d been havin’.”

“Well … we did make love for the first time in a long time.”

“Yeah, but it’s not like we’d never made love before.”

“Ok, you’ve got me there.  Did we wear anything different?”

“Our clothes?  Sweetness, come on, now.”

“Well, I’m trying to think of everything.”

“Ok, baby, ok,” he relented.  “Do you remember what we were wearing?”

Kayla thought about it.  “No, actually.”

“You had a t-shirt on when we went to bed.  The blue one.  Remember, you didn’t want to take it off because of your scar.”

Kayla felt a blush redden her cheeks as she looked into his eyes.  He reached a hand over to caress her cheek.

“And that’s all you were wearin’ when we finally went to bed, Sweetness.”  Kayla smiled shyly.

“Well, did we do anything that day that was weird?”

“Baby, no, we really didn’t.  It was just an ordinary day.  I think I bought groceries, and I remember Stephanie went out that night with Chelsea.”  Kayla crossed her arms and gave an irritated sigh. “Kayla, I’m tryin’ here, but I’m tellin’ you, I don’t remember us doing anything that didn’t belong.”

Her stance softened, and she drew her knees up to her chest and rested her forehead against them.  “I don’t know,” she said as the words muffled into her knees.  “But I want to go home, too.  Together.”

“Sweetness, maybe it’s not something we did.  Maybe someone else is doing it to us.”

Kayla’s mouth hung open.  “For what reason?  Why?”

“Who the hell knows, baby, why did Dimera turn me into a zombie?  People pull all kinds of bullshit in that town.  It wouldn’t be the first time something impossible happened.”

Kayla’s head was starting to spin with the concept that someone might have taken them out of their bed and started them on a journey through time, and her mouth hung open again.  “You think Stefano Dimera is doing this to us?”

“I dunno,” he started to raise his voice as the possibilities ran through his head.  “But I think what’s happening is crazy, and I don’t actually have another explanation, like the wrong clothes.”

Now Kayla was getting mad, too.  “So, you think this whole discussion is stupid then, is that it?”

“I didn’t say that, Kayla, did I say that?  No, I didn’t say that.”

“Why are you yelling at me?” She swung her legs off the bed and stood up.

“I don’t know!”  And he stood up, too.

Then they went to each other and embraced.  “Sorry,” they both said simultaneously. 

Steve kissed the top of her head.  “I want to figure it out.  I do, baby.  I’ll think harder.”

“No, it’s ok.  Let’s just give it a rest and try again later.”

Steve leaned down and kissed her.  “You’re too good to me, Sweetness.”  Then she snaked her hand down from his shoulder over his rear and reached it around to fondle his penis.  He enjoyed the feel of his wife touching him, and she felt him harden quickly. “What are you doing, Sweetness?”

“You don’t know?”

Steve chuckled.  “Oh, I think I know,” he moaned.  “But it’s getting light out.  Are the workers – uh, pioneers – gonna show up here?”

“I’m – not sure.  What day is it?”

Steve realized that he had no idea.  Then it hit him that he was AWOL as Daniel Lucas and that they were on the run. “Kayla, I think we need to get outta here.”

Kayla stopped fondling her husband and quickly realized he was right.  “Yeah, we do,” she said.  “What do you want to do?”

Steve knew what he wanted to do, but he wasn’t sure if it was the right answer or not.  “Kayla, I wasn’t kidding.  I really want to go home.  Not just to 2009, but to our home.  The house.  I miss that house.  Can we go there?”

“Well, of course we can go there, but … what about Marcus?”  She purposely left out Shane’s name.

“Kayla, nothing is going to change.  It doesn’t matter what we do.  Besides, I can just go to my ISA contact – what was her name?”

“Gail.”

“Right, Gail.  I can go to Gail and tell her everything I already know, and then they can go and get ‘em.  Marcus is safe if we do that, right?”

“I don’t know, I think so.  He took care of me after I walked back last time, but I don’t know for sure.”

Steve ran his hand through his hair and tried not to lose his temper.  “Kayla, let’s just go home, ok?  We’ll go, take stock, and figure things out.”

“What about Faith?”

“Dammit.  I don’t know.  Maybe if we just expose them all now it’ll be better in the end, anyway.  Maybe avoid Taylor being killed, too.”  Then he threw up his arms in frustration.  “But it doesn’t matter, ‘cause it’s all gonna reset when we jump, dammit!”

Kayla knew he was right.  And she wanted to go home, too.  “Ok, let’s go,” she said.  “But … how are we going to get there?  It’s too long a walk back to Salem, I know that from the first time.”

He hated to say it, but he couldn’t think of a better plan.  “Well,” he said.  “There’s gotta be a phone in one of these buildings.  Let’s call Marcus.”

Chapter Text

Find Me
Chapter 23

Steve watched as Kayla hurriedly tidied up the things they’d used.  That’s my baby.  Always thinking of everyone else, even here in the Twilight Zone.  Then they gathered themselves up and headed out into the dawn. 

It was a sheer stroke of luck that the cabin next door had a phone in it.  It was different than the others and seemed more like an office disguised as a cabin.  Probably because that’s pretty much what it was.  Steve looked through the heavy-paned window and clearly saw it sitting on a very 20^th century desk.  Unfortunately, the building was locked up tight.  He hated to have to break the period-looking, masterfully crafted window, so instead he broke down the door, slamming his shoulder into it.  Kayla flinched at the crack and just hoped it was the door and not his shoulder.  Steve rubbed at it but appeared fine other than the annoyed look on his face.

“I’m too old for this shit.”  Then he looked over at Kayla with a silly grin on his face, and they both laughed at the irony.

“You sure about that?” Kayla joked.

“Only in my own mind, Sweetness,” he said as he rubbed his shoulder.  The truth was that it felt good to be so young again.  If only his late-model awareness could match it.  “Come here and kiss my boo-boo, anyway.”

Kayla giggled and placed a kiss on Steve’s shoulder as they enjoyed the light moment.  Quickly, however, they set about the task of trying to remember how to find Marcus.  It was too early in the morning for him to be at the Emergency Center, and neither of them remembered his phone number anymore.   So, Steve picked up the phone and did something he hadn’t done in a very long time.  He dialed 411.  Sure enough, his best friend was listed, and before long, the phone was ringing in Marcus’s apartment.

It wasn’t even 5am, and Marcus should have been groggy, but he was used to being awakened in the middle of the night and assumed this was the hospital calling. 

Steve was silent for a second after his friend answered, then he just had to shove past the awkward.  “Marcus?  It’s me, Steve.”

“Steve?!  Man, I can’t tell you how happy I am to hear your voice!  I’ve been trying to find you for weeks now, where the hell are you?”

“Homey, listen, Kayla and I, we … we need your help.  Can you come get us?”

 “’Us?’  What, Kayla’s with you?”

“Yeah, we’re holed up at some Pioneer Village place near Saul Taylor’s retreat.”

“Pioneer village … pioneer village …,” Marcus thought out loud.

“Can you plug it into your G—“

“No!” Kayla interjected with a loud whisper as Steve rolled his eyes at himself.

“—I mean, do you know where it is?”

“I think I do, but Steve, what the hell are you doing out there?  What’s that place got to do with this mess?”

“Nevermind that right now, can you get out here to get us or what, we’re stranded here.”

“Yeah, yeah, I’m there, just hold tight.”

“And DON’T tell anyone you’re coming out here or that I called.  It’s just any other day for you, ok?  We’re hiding in one of the buildings, and when I see your car, we’re gonna come to you, got that Homey?”

“You got it, man, I’m on my way.”

An hour later it was bright as day, and the two of them no longer felt as confident in their hiding spot.  Just as Steve was about to give up and go with Plan B, which was to call Gail, he saw the expensive luxury car slowly make its way up the road to the village. 

“There he is, come on, baby.  You go first, so he sees someone he recognizes.”

As it happened, it didn’t make much of a difference, as the second Steve crawled into the backseat Marcus nearly fell out of his chair.  The eye he was expecting, but the rest of it was like the anti-Steve, and all he could do was stare. 

Steve was beyond amused and couldn’t help but roll with laughter at the slack-jawed look his best friend was giving him.  “It’s me, Homey, look,” he assured him as he leaned over Kayla’s shoulder and gave her a peck on the lips.  “Now, can ya drive us home?  I’ll explain on the way.”

Kayla smiled.  It was slightly less of a shock to the system to see him than it was on election night, and she was able to enjoy seeing their good friend, remembering bittersweetly how they could always count on him.  “Trust me,” she said, “It’s Steve.”

Marcus closed his mouth as a broad grin spread out across his face.  “Damn, if I’m not the finest plastic surgeon I know,” he said as he put the car into gear and tore out of there.

“You are, aren’t ya?” Steve bellowed.

“I am, man, look how pretty you are now.”

“Now?  I was pretty before!”

“Not this pretty, man.”

“Ya think so, do ya?  Yeah, well, you got it almost perfect, Homey”

“Almost?  Hey, don’t blame me for that surfer shade of blonde, man, that’s your stylist’s fault.” 

Steve laughed.   “Yeah, who knew the ISA had agent beauticians?”

Marcus eyed him in the rearview mirror before Steve laid down across the backseat so he wouldn’t be seen by the wrong eyes.  “I amaze even myself,” Marcus said softly to himself.  Steve grinned and was truly elated to be there with Marcus.

The drive back to Steve and Kayla’s house was filled with laughter.  And a lot of lies.  It was a weird place to be.  Marcus asked one question after the next after the next one after that, and it was all the two of them could do to keep their friend at bay.  One minute Steve was happily throwing brotherly insults back and forth to his best friend, the next he was explaining how he and Kayla got there with omissions, half-truths, and downright lies while guilt set up shop.  Kayla tried to keep it all straight in her head, but with each friendly jibe that made her laugh right along with them came an equal amount of confusion as to what part of the story she thought they should be telling him.  And always running in the background was the fact that it was going to reset, so why try so hard?  Because you don’t know how long you’ll be here, and you don’t want to shoot yourself in the foot.  

They explained how Kayla got there in the van, Steve’s cover as Daniel Lucas, and the whole drug cartel headed by Jehricho; those parts were the truth.  But when it came to Faith, timing, discussions Kayla had with Marcus “yesterday,” and other nitty gritty details it got fuzzy, even for Kayla.  These were details long forgotten to her, and in all fairness, even Gail Carson’s name was something she barely pulled from her memory.  In fact, Gail, herself, was a subject neither of them knew how to address.  Steve remembered that Marcus had really cared about her, maybe even loved her, and the whole business with her being ISA and keeping him in the dark had really been a blow to him.  So, neither one of them had named the ISA contact that they mentioned they were going to call as soon as they got home.  They also didn’t talk about how they’d come to know so much about what was really going on behind Reverend Taylor’s revival tent since, technically, most of it hadn’t happened yet.  They just did the best they could with generalizations, vagaries, and changing the subject when it got too close to something they couldn’t explain without sounding stark raving mad. 

Marcus walked Kayla in right through the front door as if they’d just been out to breakfast, but Steve snuck in through a broken window at the side of the house that he noticed the last time they jumped here.  He had hoped it would be there at this earlier time and breathed a sigh of relief when it was. The last thing he needed was the neighbors seeing some stranger walking in the front door with his wife.  Yet, he was also a little unnerved by it and wondered who else was able to get in and snoop around so easily; he made a mental note to fix the window. 

When they all met up in the living room, Marcus watched with a smile as Steve and Kayla embraced with joy to be back in their home again.  This shouldn’t have been too strange, as Steve had spent weeks undercover, after all, and would have been happy to be home. But something about this embrace between his two best friends was off. 

Kayla saw the way Marcus was warily eyeing them over Steve’s shoulder and knew if they didn’t shoo him out of there that more questions they didn’t want were going to start anew.  “Ah, Marcus.  Thanks for coming for us, so early in the morning and everything.”  She looked up at Steve, who took his wife’s non-verbal cues only the two of them understood.

“Yeah, man,” Steve said with a bit of disappointment at the fact that they had to let him go, “I can’t tell you how much we appreciate it.”

Marcus was no dummy.  Something was up.  “Are you people for real, here?  I was not born yesterday, and I know that you are hiding something.  Now, how about you stop insulting my intelligence and just be out with it?”

“Marcus, I – don’t know what you’re talking about,” Kayla said.

“No, of course, you don’t.  I’m sure you don’t either, do you, Steve?”

“Marcus,” Steve said putting on his best innocent act, “I don’t, man. We’ve told you everything we know, and now I’ve gotta call my ISA contact and get them this information before anything else happens out there.  Especially to you.”  That part, at least, was the truth.

Marcus glared at him with his arms folded in front of him.

“Homey.  Come on, now, Faith is depending on me, I’ve gotta make calls and get this over with so that I can come out from this cover and start growin’ my hair back, man.”

“Steve—“

“Dude, I also wouldn’t mind bein’ alone with my wife, if ya don’t mind.”

“Isn’t that where you just were?”

Steve held out his hand toward Marcus, who instinctively began slapping it with his own back and forth in the “secret handshake” Steve hadn’t done with his best friend in 20 years.  “Trust me?  Please, Homey?” 

Kayla walked Marcus to the door and gave his hand a squeeze.  “Thank you, Marcus.”

“Alright, I’ll go,” he said grudgingly, “but I’m not dropping this.  I’ll see you later,” he said.

“Later?”

“The Emergency Center, you close tonight just like last night, remember?”

“Right!” she said.  “I’ll … be there.”

No, you won’t, Steve thought.

Kayla then walked back to the living room to give Steve a moment with his best friend. 

“Trust me, Marcus.  Trust that I know what I’m doing.”

Marcus eyed Steve and then nodded.  “Womb to tomb, right?”

“Womb to tomb,” Steve replied.  “It’ll be over real soon, ok?  Thanks again, man.”  Steve gathered Marcus in a bear hug and tried his best to keep his eyes from betraying him. 

Marcus started out the door then turned back.  “Promise me one thing, man.  Don’t mess up my handiwork, ok?”

Steve froze as every little hair on his arms and legs stood up.  That last statement really shook him.  He tried to let it roll off his back and forced a smile as he nodded.  Then Steve closed the door on the man he was lucky enough to get impossible time with not once but twice.  He didn’t know if there would be a third. 

"You can now, you know," Kayla said from behind him.

Steve whirled around, startled.  “Oh, baby, don’t do that.”

Kayla walked into his arms and kissed his cheek.  “You can keep that eye if you want to.  Now that you know what happens, you aren't likely to be injured.  For as long as we're here, you get to keep your eye.”

Steve frowned.  “I don’t want to,” he said.  Kayla knew why.

“You don’t need that patch to be my Steve.  You don’t need to feel guilty while wearing the face you were born with, either.  We know Marina is coming, so we can handle everything differently.  Better.”

Steve kissed the top of Kayla’s head and ran his hand over the walls as he made his way back to the living room.  “There’s no ‘we’ here, Sweetness, I’m the one who has to handle everything differently.”

Kayla looked at him like he’d grown a second head then followed close behind.  “Steve?  Are we remembering two different things?  There were two of us in that situation, and I could have done a lot of things differently.  I should have done some things differently.”

“Like what?  Ask me if I’d ever had a secret wife?”

“Stop it," she snapped.  I don’t want to hear you put yourself down anymore.  I’m not perfect, you know.  How about that you had to hear about my pregnancy from Jack?  Did I handle that perfectly?  Do you think I'm proud of myself?  No, I had plenty of chances to tell you and didn’t.  Even if I was mad, one of my biggest regrets in my whole life is that you didn’t hear it from me.”

Steve felt a stab of regret at the reminder of that time.  When Jack told him about it on the pier that night, it about killed him.  Steve plowed his hand through his hair and started to fidget.

Kayla knew that look he had on his face. That was Steve trying not to be angry at her.  Finally, she knew she hit a nerve that might break him out of this self-hatred he was having. 

 "So, now do you think maybe we were in this together?  That maybe I didn't do quite right by you during that whole time, either?"

"Why are we talking about this, Kayla?  Why are you dredging that whole thing up?"

"I didn't dredge it up, Steve, we're in it!  We're living it right now!  You said she showed up on your way home from DC, that's, what, a week away?  All I'm saying is that you need to stop hating yourself for it.  You did the wrong thing, yes, fine!  But so did I.  It's not about who was more wrong, it was about letting us hurt each other.”  She rubbed her hand up and down his arm, hating the spat they were suddenly having and softened her tone.  “I wish I could go back and make sure I told you about what our love made myself.  That makes it both of us that can handle everything differently."

Steve hated to acknowledge anything in Kayla that could be defined as needing room for improvement, let alone admitting he was angry at her.  But the truth was that the hurt of that singular mistake on Kayla's part did still sting, even if it had dulled to near non-existence by now.  

She saw Steve struggle with it as he worked the muscle in his jaw, refusing to look her in the eye.  She gently placed a forefinger to her husband’s chin and forced him to look at her.  "It's ok to be a little mad at me."

He glanced away again before she could see the hurt in his eyes.  "Ok, I'm a little mad at you," he said quietly.  Kayla smiled.  "That makes you happy?" he asked looking back at her in disbelief.

"Yes," she said with eyes that meant it.  "It does."  Then she went to him and wrapped her arms around his waist and laid her head on his chest.  "Now if we're here long enough, we can fix all those things, and you can stop hating that handsome face of yours."

Steve closed his eyes to the feel of his wife in his arms.  She really was amazing.

“I think we should see if we wake up here tomorrow, and if we do, we can talk about how to handle Marina.  Until then, let’s call Gail, then … just enjoy being here in our home.  Just for today, let’s be us.  Here.  At home.”

Steve smiled.  “You always were the smart one, Sweetness.”

An hour later, Steve hung up with a very angry Gail, whom they found at the Emergency Center, and told her that no matter how badly she wanted to talk to him right now, he’d just told her everything she needed to know, Marcus was safe, and, no, he wasn’t going anywhere to debrief on anything or rescue anyone.  Not right now.  Gail tried to reason with him that his refusal to elaborate on how he came to know about Shane and the secret room in the mountain and Jericho and the revival front would put him in hot water with the ISA.  But that was just too bad, because he was home, and he wanted to enjoy it. 

Steve hung up, and he felt the duty toward the people he left behind resolve itself.  For however long he would be here, he felt like right had been done.  And he realized … as much as he'd wanted out of this body before, now he kind of didn’t want to jump yet.

Steve gathered Kayla into his arms and sat heavily with her on the couch.  “You know what, baby?”

“Mm?” she cooed as she enjoyed the feel of her head in the crook of his neck.

“I’m starving.  Wanna raid the kitchen?”

“Yes!” she said as hunger suddenly became the only thing she was feeling.  Kayla bounded up and pulled her husband along with her.

They arrived to the fridge with empty stomachs of hope.  And for once, they were greeted with a fridge that had enough food in it to give them a real meal.  It may not have been truly stocked, but it was more than sufficient.  They prepared pasta with chicken, broccoli, and asparagus and had their first ice cold soda in positively days.  It was quite a feast compared to their last meal, which they couldn’t swear to, but they believed was four jumps ago in Steve’s apartment. 

“It’s interesting how the place has changed since our last jump, isn’t it?” Kayla asked.

Steve thought about it.  “Yeah, but our last jump was just about a year from now, wasn’t it?”

That statement made no sense, yet Kayla understood it.  “Ugh, don’t confuse me with the timeline stuff,” she groaned, “but I think you’re right, yeah.”

“By the way,” Steve interjected between forkfuls of spaghetti, “did you know we have a broken window on the side of the house?  Anyone could have just strolled right in here like I did.”

“I, ah, I don’t remember.  I’m not sure if I knew that or not.”

“Well, we do, baby.  Not for long, though,” he said as he took another heaping bite.

“Why?”

“’Cause I’m gonna fix it tomorrow.” 

This made Kayla take pause. 

“What?” Steve asked.

“This morning you wanted to go home, and now you want to stay long enough that you have time to fix the window?”

Steve quietly looked her in the eye.  “Sweetness, I do want to go home.”  His eyes told her how much he missed Joe even if his voice couldn’t form the words.  “And I want to stop the leaping.  But—,” he cut himself off.  She waited patiently for him to work it through.  Then he looked over at something rather interesting by the stove and said, “If I hadn’t died—I mean if they hadn’t taken me away, then this house still would have been our home.  Sweetness, this was it.  This was home.  In my head, this house is where we belong.  I guess I just wanna spend some time in it, the two of us, like it would have been if we were back home in it in 2009. 

She looked at her husband and felt the longing that was radiating from him and realized that she felt the same way.  This really was home, and she missed it, too.  “Steve, I don’t know how long we’ll be here or if you’ll get to fix the window.”

“It’s not about the window, Sweetness.”

“I know,” she said getting up to sit in her husband’s lap.  “But we seem to be spending only a little while in each place, so …” she strummed her finger across his left eyebrow, “… I have an idea.”

“Oh yeah, and what’s that?”

“I think we should go exploring,” she smiled down at him.  Steve beamed at her.  He loved that idea.  “You know, like when we first got here, discovering all those little secret passages and cubbies.  Last time we were here we weren’t sure what was going on—“

“Right, baby, ‘cause now we’ve got that all figured out.”

“—so we were kind of afraid to do much.  Steve!” she smacked him in the shoulder with his little remark.  Now, come on, I’m being serious.”

“Baby,” he mocked injury as he chuckled, “don’t smack me around, that’s the bad shoulder.”

“Oh, do I need to kiss it again?”

“Definitely.”

Kayla gave him a “you will never learn” look and bent down to kiss his shoulder for the second time that morning.  “All better?”

“Yeahp, I think so.”

“Ok, so as I was saying, Mr. Johnson, I think it would be fun to go enjoy the special features of our house.  More of the scenic route than we took the last time we jumped here.”

“Can we make a stop in the bedroom?” Steve asked with a smirk.

“I,” Kayla replied in a sultry voice as she got up off his lap, “wouldn’t have it any other way.”  Steve followed her up off the chair, grabbed her and captured her lips in a deep and romantic kiss.  Their tongues danced as their bodies pressed against each other with love and desire.  Kayla wrapped her arms around his neck, and Steve brought his to her rear and the back of her head respectively, clutching her in his protective embrace. 

In that moment, the two of them felt more at home than at any other time since they’d begun this wild trip through time.  In that moment, they didn’t need to understand why or how or who.  In that moment, they were home.

*        *         *         *

He pushed back from the monitor and was extraordinarily pleased with what he saw.  The data wasn’t just mathematically sound, it was as close to perfect as he’d dared to hope for.  Which, truth be told, wasn’t actually very perfect at all, but time was rarely perfect, so he was pleased all the same.  The only real surprise was just how unstable the slipstream was.  He knew it would be, but the complexity of it all once it was actually set in motion he was not prepared for.  Not that it mattered.  He smiled to himself as he laughed with satisfaction as the constant stream of numbers scrolled by on his wayward pair, pleased in the knowledge that he was finally making good on what should have been done in the first place.

*         *         *         *

Several hours later, Steve and Kayla were dusty and cobwebby from their scenic tour and went upstairs to clean up. Steve was more than happy to get rid of his Daniel Lucas wardrobe and was surprised it took him so long.  But somewhere between the end of the hallway and their bedroom, Kayla had stopped short.  When he looked back for her, he saw her staring into what would become Stephanie’s room. The look on her face was not one of sweet nostalgia.  Uh oh.

“Sweetness?”  Kayla turned toward him, and Steve saw his wife visibly blanch.  “Kayla?  What is it?” 

“Steve,” Kayla whispered.  “Making Stephanie … it’s going to be so … hard to make sure she—that we—that we get her.”  Kayla opened the door and walked into her daughter’s room, disappearing from Steve’s sight.  He immediately bounded the few steps it took to follow her and ensure she was in his eyeshot.

“Don’t disappear like that, baby.”

Kayla ignored the statement and went on with her previous thought.  “It’s going to be almost impossible.”

"Sweetness, are you forgetting something very important?  What we’re doing isn’t changing anything.  Remember?  So, Stephanie is going to be made, born, and be her mama’s daughter."

 "We don't know that for sure."

 "What, election night didn't drive that home?"

 "Well, yes, it did," Kayla admitted, but she was a worrier, and she wasn't sure they could count on one incidence.  "But it was just that one jump, maybe things were changed and we couldn't tell."

"No, Kayla, that man didn't have a mark on him, and I remember what I did to his lip. My knuckles felt what I did to his lip.  There's no way.  I'm telling you, it's like we were never there."

He was right, Kayla knew that they changed the future, yet those changes didn't take by the time they'd jumped back. 

"What is this really about, Kayla?  Why are you so worried about making Stephanie."

 "I don't want to ... lose her.  I’m afraid we'll be here a really long time when we're supposed to conceive her and then not do it, and then what if we're here a long time?  I don't want to lose our baby."

 “Don’t say that, Kayla, we know just when to make her.”

“No, I don’t think we do.  And even if we did, that call you made this morning means that Reverend Taylor is probably going to live, which means we won’t have his funeral, and we won’t make love that night.”  She was starting to get quite upset. “And Marina had started sending stuff to you by then, so that night we have to—we need—to make sure—"

“Baby, baby, baby, you’ve gotta calm down, now, we don’t need the funeral or anything else to still make sure we make love.  We’ll conceive our daughter, Kayla, we will.”

“But it’s statistically impossible for everything to happen exactly the same way at the same time.  The egg will be the same, but there’s no way the sperm will, and that’s a different baby, Steve, that won’t be Stephanie!”

“Kayla!” He grabbed her face in his hands and plied it with kisses.  “We’re gonna make her.  Ok?  If we’re still here, we’re gonna make her.  Her.  Now you believe that, Sweetness.  Ok?”

“Steve.”

“Ok?” he asked with room for just one answer.

“Ok,” she relented.

“Wanna practice?” he asked with raised eyebrows.

Kayla let out a breathy chuckle and decided to take her own advice.  She wasn’t convinced by any means that conceiving their children would be as easy to do as the first time.  She knew the randomness with which human reproduction really operated, and getting their Stephanie back was going to be difficult if nothing else.  But, she realized that stressing over it right at this moment was not going to get anyone anywhere and that if Steve could take it one day at a time with how he was feeling, she could, too.  So, she took a deep breath and released that worry for the time being.  Let’s see if we wake up here in the morning.

The tug at their midsections was strong and the incongruities meeting their eyes came in an instant. 

Or not, she added as a commensurate afterthought.

“Dammit!” Steve yelled as he reached for his wife. 

Bye house, Kayla said silently.  Then they clutched on to each other in a deep embrace, and rather than bury her head in her husband’s neck, this time she pulled back and looked him in the eyes.  “I love you,” she said, “in any face.”  The love she saw reflected back in those eyes told her all she needed to know before they finally jumped away.

A moment later Steve was met with biting cold.  He knew without even looking that he was alone again.  Shit, what the hell are we doing wrong, here?!  Before he could finish the thought he detected the steel between his teeth as the bitterness of the wind thrashed at his skin.  Like the jump before this one, he was stumped as to where he was.  Then he realized that he was standing on a ladder, and the reality of his situation hit him with an icy fear that had nothing to do with the weather.  I’m at the Deveraux estate.  And Kayla’s inside … dying.   

Chapter Text

Find Me
Chapter 24

In all their jumps so far, Kayla had never felt so sick upon arrival.  Her mouth was bone dry, she tried in vain to swallow, and it was hot.  “Steve … where …” are we?  She was surprised that the words came to her so weakly that she couldn’t finish the sentence out loud.   

The room was awash in blurry shadow, and she was too dizzy to focus.  The silence that followed her call to him told her that Steve was not there.  Where was he?  Did they jump separately again?  She tried to direct her attention to her surroundings, but she was so disoriented she couldn’t see straight.  Kayla slowly shifted her eyes back and forth as her head followed slowly behind them.  The dark walls she didn’t recognize cast an ominous air to this place, and after several moments when the jump effect had not passed she closed her eyes and knew she was in trouble. 

Kayla felt the comforter beneath her and realized she was lying in a bed.  I think I’m sick.  She forced herself to lift her hand to her head and felt her hair tied up in a clip.  Another weak plea to her husband was met with nothing more than an empty room, and Kayla’s heart began to race.  Why was her mouth so dry?  She was so nauseous.  The doctor in her knew she had a fever, and from the heat behind her eyes, she knew it was high.  Really sick.  And that’s as far as she got in figuring out when she was, because she couldn’t think. 

Maybe I’m drunk again.  It was the last thought she had before she gave up and allowed her mind to drift in and out of coherence.

Steve was trying to get his shit together on the ladder, the hilt of his knife still in his teeth.  This isn’t happening, he said to himself, this just isn’t happening!  Some memories were more faded than others, but this one was clear as a bell.  Not only was there no doubt in his mind when he was, but he could retrace the steps of this nightmare like they happened yesterday.  Somewhere not too far below the surface, Steve wanted to scream.  He wanted to just stop and take a breath.  Take time to think about what he needed to do and who he needed to call.  But he had to push it down and simply act, because if there was one thing about the course of these events that was critical, it was the timing. 

Knowing he wasn’t going to need it, Steve took the knife out of his mouth, reset it, and nestled it safely back in a pocket.  As he moved quickly up the ladder, he took a moment to glance below at the hayride on the not so far off lawn that he and Kayla would be taking in the not so far off future.  “I’m comin’, baby.  Hang on.”

Kayla’s fever dreams were confusing and euphoric and heartbreaking.  Joyful images of Joe swaddled in her arms were at the forefront of her mind.  Then her nursing school graduation with her brothers piling on the hugs and kisses.  Making love to Steve on the roof of the loft.  Riding in a gondola after their first wedding.  Soon the dreams turned to nightmares.  Jack on top of her in the loft, Steve dead in her arms, watching him leave the prison with Stephanie, and visions of him kissing Billie before his memories returned.  “Steve!” she cried out in a stream of whimpers.  Steve!  But she was alone, and she was scared.  It was then in the throes of her fever that she finally understood what was happening to her. What had been happening to her all this time.  What this time jumping was all about.

It was the fever.

She was having one big, long fever dream.  She couldn’t believe she didn’t realize it before, she’s a doctor, for God’s sake!  She couldn’t wait to tell Steve about this crazy dream of their shared life together.  Then, unbeknownst to her, she faded back out, forgetting her epiphany as quickly as she’d found it.

Steve didn’t have to think too hard, as even all these years later, he could retrace his steps to where he found Kayla dying in her bed.  And tonight would be no different.  Scaling the wall, Steve reached the 2^nd story window with the ease this young body fueled by fear and desperation easily afforded him.  When he opened the window and parted the gauzy drapes before him, it was positively surreal.  The déjà vu was strong, and he felt sick to his stomach at the weeks that lie ahead.  Without taking a single beat, he poured himself into the hallway and immediately got up and headed for the room he knew would contain his wife.

He knew exactly what he was going to find; yet the sight of Kayla looking so frail, so completely and appallingly ill, and laying in what was quite literally designed to be her deathbed was no easier now as it was the first time around.  He watched as she sensed his presence and turned her big, glassy eyes upon him as tears stung at the backs of his own. 

She couldn’t say what roused her from the poison-induced waves of delirium, but seeing Steve run to her made things a lot more clear. 

“Baby?” Steve cried.  “Oh, Kayla.”  He wrapped his arms around her, scooped her up, and held her as his tears fell into her golden hair.  Tears of relief that he found her so quickly, worry that it was in this state, and anger that they had to go through this all over again.  “It’s gonna be ok, Sweetness.  I promise.”  He couldn’t spare a single moment, but he afforded himself this one to connect with her and feel her in his arms.  Seeing her like this again was hell on earth, and he just held her tightly to his chest as he shored himself up to do what had to be done next.  Escape with her.

Kayla felt Steve’s cool leather jacket bathe her hot cheeks in welcome relief.  She held on while the fever dreams fell away into forgotten oblivion and realized with certainty where she was.  Hot as a hare, blind as a bat, dry as a bone, red as a beet, and mad as a hatter the classic med school mnemonic went.  “Steve,” Kayla murmured, “atropine … poisoning.  It’s the atro … pine.”

“Shh, baby, I know,” he said rocking her.  “Don’t talk, honey, I know.”  He kissed the top of her head and laid her back down.  His stolen moment was over, and now he had to get her out of there.  “Ok, listen, baby,” he said in a voice he fought to maintain the calm over, “can ya understand me, Sweetness?”

Kayla nodded and mouthed, “yeah.”

“Good girl, ok.  We have to go now.  This is gonna have to go exactly like the last time, ok?  Do ya remember the last time?”  Kayla shook her head no, “Yeah, you were pretty out of it then,” he said scanning the room and spotting her coat.  “That’s ok, I’ll remember for the both of us.”

“K,” she whispered, blinking slowly as she tried to focus.

Like the first time they went though this, Steve worked Kayla into her coat, then disappeared into her closet to find a pair of her shoes.  “Don’t worry, Sweetness, just looking for something to put on your feet,” he said as the applause wafted in the open door from the political fundraiser below.  The first thing he grabbed was the black pumps, but an image of Kayla running through the woods of their last jump made him quickly throw them aside and pick up her sneakers instead.  “No swollen feet this time, baby.”  It took longer to get them onto her feet than he’d anticipated, however, and he started feeling the pressure of time.  “We’ll do the laces later, ok, baby?  Yeah, that’s right, we don’t need those laces, I’m doin’ all the walkin’.”

Kayla was too busy trying not to pass out from the serious damage the poison was doing to her body to process whatever Steve’s think-out-loud dialogue was.  She was just happy to hear his voice, whatever it might be saying. 

“Ok, come here, Sweetness,” he said as he gathered her in his arms.  “Time to go to our little private hospital on the edge of town, now.”  Steve was on full autopilot now and didn’t even register how light she was in his arms.  He was hoping to avoid the senator this time, but it wasn’t to be, and once again, Steve was met with a confrontation just outside her bedroom door.

“Hold it Johnson!” the senator demanded.

“Jesus, I can’t seem to get rid of you, can I?” Steve groaned.  “Why do you have to keep turnin’ up, huh?”

“What do you think you're doing?”

“Same thing as last time, but you don’t remember that, do you?  No, it’s just Kayla and me on this little trip down memory lane, isn’t it?”  Harper looked at him through slits, not sure what to make of the long-haired hoodlum that inexplicably shared a bloodline with his son.  “So, get out of the way, old man.”

“Don't be a fool, you're abducting her, she's a sick woman!”

“I don’t have any more time to argue with you this time as last time, so get out of my way!” Steve seethed as he shifted and re-shifted Kayla in his arms.

“I'll call the police!”

“You go ahead and call the police, asshole, that’ll save me a trip there, myself!”

Harper tried a new tack now that the police bluff failed.  “Where’re you going to go with her?”  Steve didn’t answer, but instead plowed right into the senator that was blocking his way down the back stairs.  Harper wasn’t taking the chance that he might get away with his daughter-in-law while she was still breathing, so he grabbed Steve’s arm in an attempt to halt his progress down the hall.  “This is kidnapping!” he barked.

Steve slowly turned a dangerous eye on Senator Deveraux.  “Now you listen to me, you serious fuck.”  Steve’s voice was threatening, leaving no doubt that he’d do what he had to, including use physical force.  “I don't care who you are.  I don’t care who you know.  I don’t care if you’ve got a standing lunch date with President Obama.”  Harper had no idea who Steve was talking about.  “I got her out of here quietly last time, but if you ever touch me again – and if you even think of attacking her in the future – I’m going to find you, and I’m going to kill you.  You got me?”  Harper remained stoic, but the fear in his eyes betrayed him.  “Now you get out of my way before I rearrange your face so it’s even uglier than it is now.”

“You're making a big mistake,” Harper said without confidence as he stepped aside.

“Come on baby,” Steve said as he kissed her head.  He made his way down the back stairs, past the kitchen, and out the door undetected.  Now he headed into the cold night of Salem with Kayla in his arms.  

Chapter Text

Find Me
Chapter 25

Kayla was freezing even under the coat, and the jostling as Steve carried her to the car did nothing for her dizziness.  Her body was screaming to just pass out like she did years ago, but the gravity of this jump was impossible for her to ignore.  As she felt Steve hold her securely in his arms, Kayla was horrified at this turn of events.  She fought the haze of poison to assess her symptoms, the most serious one being the increase in her own heart rate.

“Steve,” she whimpered.

“Shh, we’re almost to the car.”

“Tachy.  I’m tachy.  Need  phys … physos—“

“Sweetness,” he huffed as he looked down into the enormous pools of black her dilated eyes had become, “it’s ok, baby, I remember what to get.” 

She let her head loll against him, the effort to hold it straight too much.  The very small part of Kayla’s consciousness that was lucid enough to become clinical was fascinated.  She could feel just how sick she was, observing her dry mouth, fever, and heart rate as if she were standing outside of herself.  If she were a patient of hers, Kayla would have been hospitalized and rated her condition as serious.  But what struck her more was that Steve managed to bring her back from this.  Kayla knew she was in serious trouble, and through sheer, desperate devotion, he saved her all those years ago.  It’s not like she didn’t know this already, of course, she did, but not because she actually remembered any of it.  She had a stray image here and there, but no real memories of when he’d taken her from the Deveraux house or the days after.  Her first memory was waking up in Gabrielle’s house and Steve telling her what happened.  So, this was Steve’s second time through these events, but it was brand new for Kayla.  And she was awestruck by what Steve did to save her – what he was doing again this very minute to save her.  He managed to reverse the poisoning, nurse her back to health, hide her from the Deverauxs, and fight the internal war with himself over what to do about this for his brother all at the same time.  She clutched on to Steve with what little strength she had, she loved him so much.

Steve opened the passenger door of the bluesmobile and stuffed her inside.  Her vision was so blurry,  and when she squinted against the light as Steve opened the driver’s side door to get in, it reinforced her knowledge that the poisoning was quite advanced. 

“You ok, baby?” Steve asked, “You doin’ alright?” the concern in his voice so evident to Kayla as he palmed the hair off her forehead.  She nodded despite feeling the opposite, but Steve knew better.  “Ok, it’s ok, Marcus is gonna get you fixed up,” he said as he caressed her face and placed reassuring kisses on her hot cheeks. 

Kayla turned her glassy eyes on Steve and used all the strength she had to cup her husband’s face in her hand.  She felt a fresh tear fall from his eye and felt a stab of pain for him.  She knew he hated seeing her like this, and she hated that he was going to have to do all the work this time.  My poor husband can’t get a break.   She stroked the tear away with the pad of her thumb, her best effort to comfort him through this horrific jump they’d landed in and gave him a smile.  “Gonna … be’okay.”  It was the last thing she was able to muster before she felt herself start to slip back into unconsciousness.  “Love you,” she mouthed.

Steve watched as her eyes started to lose focus completely.  Her hand fell away from his face to the seat, and he let out a stifled cry.  He pulled her down so that her head lay on his right thigh, turned on the ignition, and flew down the road as he began stroking her hair. 

It only took 20 minutes to get to ISA agent, Gabrielle Pascal’s, rental on the edge of Salem.  He didn’t think, he just drove.  But as he recounted the events to figure out what he needed to do next, he realized that had a serious problem.  He could and did pick the lock since he didn’t have the benefit of Gabrielle’s house key this time, and he knew he could convince her to let him stay there.  The problem was that if he was going to get the antidote for her, he was going to have to leave her alone in the house.  In all these jumps, they’d taken very good care not to separate from each other.  This time it was going to be impossible not to.  Not if he wanted Kayla to live.

When they entered the house, Steve took Kayla right to the back bedroom and laid her down.  Seeing the dark cherry four-poster evoked strong memories in him.  Bitter for the anguish of not knowing if she’d live while he begged God to save her; sweet for their reunion, making love beneath the canopy, and knowing that she remained his.

He pushed away what he knew would have to happen, that he was going to have to leave her, while he got her settled.  He started a fire and turned to see her lying there exactly as she had the first time.  He knew that he had precious little time to get her that antidote but he just couldn’t find it in himself to actually leave.  What if she woke up and he wasn’t there, what would she think?  Would this body make her delirious like she was last time?  What if she needed him?  What’s more, he was scared, himself.  He was scared to be out on his own in this foreign timeline without her.  He needed her, and he didn’t want to leave without her. 

She’s gonna die, dude, you have to go now.  Go!

Steve crawled into the bed with Kayla, boots and all, and brought her in close to him.  She hadn’t woken up since she’d passed out in the car with “I love you” on her lips.  He tried to wake her so he could tell her he would be right back with her medicine.  But she wouldn’t rouse.

“Kayla,” Steve said tenderly.  “Sweetness?  Baby, can you hear me?  Wake up for me, baby, can you do that?  Can you wake up for me, please?  Just for a minute.”  When she didn’t so much as turn her head, he shifted to face her and got firmer.  “Kayla,” he demanded, holding her head in his hands.  “Kayla, now you wake up, do you hear me?  You wake up for me right now, dammit.”  Nothing.  “Kayla!”  This strategy worked no better, but he was out of time.  He pulled the covers up high over her chest and set his chin down over her breastbone.  “Baby, listen to me.  I have to go now.  I know we’ve never been apart on these jumps, but I have to get you that medicine, ok?  So, you rest now.  You sleep.”  He sat up and pulled her up to hold her against him and ran his fingers through her hair.  “You stay with me baby,” he whispered, afraid to say it too loud.  “Don’t you dare leave me.  I know what to do, Sweetness, but you have to stay here.  Don’t you leap.  And don’t you die!” 

He fought the lump in his throat and took a deep breath.  “Ok.  Sleep, Sweetness, and I’ll be back with your physostistuff, the physostigmine.  Yeah,” he said kissing the top of her head then laying her back down.  “Yeah.”  He took her hand and laced her fingers into his own.  “I’ll bet you think I didn’t remember that, huh, baby?  No, I remember, though.  I know what to get.  Don’t worry, Kayla, I’m gonna take good care of you.”  Then he kissed her once more and forced himself to disengage from her. 

He turned in the doorway, looked to the fire, then back to his wife once more before he told her he loved her and not to go anywhere.  Then he closed the bedroom door behind him and headed back to the car.  Without Kayla.

When Gabrielle Pascale heard Steve Johnson’s voice on the other end of the telephone, she wasn’t sure it was really him.  He didn’t sound like his cocky self, it was more of a tentative, unsure quality to his voice that she didn’t recognize.

“Yeah, Gabrielle.  This is Johnson,” he said into the hospital payphone.

“Yes?” she’d said with an even tone.”

“Steve Johnson,” he repeated.

“Yes, I know you’re name,” she said a little puzzled, “what can I do for you?”

“Right,” Steve replied adjusting his patch.  “Look, I know this is really asking a lot, but I need a favor from you, it’s urgent.”

“So, this is not about Shane’s mission in Greece?”

“His what?  No, no it’s not about that.  Look, I need to borrow your place.  That house you rented.  It’s really important.  Can I, uh … could you do that?”

Gabrielle was stunned.  “My place?  You’re kidding right?”

“No, I’m not foolin’ around about this, I really need it, and I need it now,” he said trying mightily not to fly off the handle and scare her away entirely.

“You want a room,” she spat into the phone, “go see Howard Johnson!”

“Listen, Gabrielle!” he desperately tried not to shout into the phone as his eyes darted to and fro hoping not to run into any whose last name was Deveraux, “I don't ask for much!  Now, I’ve done a lot for you and the ISA, and I’m not asking, here, I’m begging you.  A life is on the line, here, and I’m begging you to trust me!”

Gabrielle was taken aback by the sound of Steve Johnson on the other end of the phone.  She’d never heard him this way. It was hard not to believe him.  “Why should i trust you?” she asked with a softer and genuinely curious tone.

He did not have time for this!  “Because,” he implored her, “I’ve never complained. I’ve never asked for shit, Gabrielle.  The ISA hasn’t done shit for me, but I’ve practically given my life for them.  You don’t even have to give me the key, I can get in and out on my own.  Just let me stay there as long as I need.”

“How long do you need?” she asked.

Steve wasn’t sure what to say.  How long were they going to be there?  A fresh pang of worry hit him that a jump would happen while he was off finding medication.  Hang on, Sweetness, please hang on.  He figured he’d better just play it safe and plan for the long haul “Two or three weeks, maybe.”

“What?!”

“Well, you wanna give me an ISA safehouse instead?”

“Steve, you know I can’t just hand over the keys to an ISA safehouse!”

“Look, I don’t have time for this!” he boomed into the phone. 

That was the Steve Johnson Gabrielle knew.  Only he sounded really – desperate.  “This is really important to you, isn't it?” she asked softly.

“Yes,” he said simply. 

After a brief pause, she said, “Do you want me to bring you the key?”

Steve let out the breath he’d been holding.  “Thank you,” he said appreciatively.  “You’re saving a life.”

“Whose?”  Steve was silent.  “You’re not going to tell me, are you?”

“No.”

Gabrielle rolled her eyes and sighed.  “Where are you?”

“You bringing me the key?”

“Unless you’re going to continue to break into my house.”

“I’m not breakin—“

“Oh please, just shut up.  Where?”

“University.”

“I’ll be right there.”  Then she hung up before he could thank her.

Steve sure didn’t need Gabrielle’s key to get in and out, but he didn’t want her walking in on them and suddenly having to explain things to her.  He knew she was going to let him stay there, so just getting his presence out there was safest.  Calling her also gave him a few more moments to think through the best way to get the antidote. 

Steve leaned back against the bank of payphones and was oddly struck by how out of place they seemed to his 2009 mind.  What I’d do for my cell right about now, he thought. 

Steve knew that time was short and he had to get the meds.  Marcus was the obvious choice, Steve knew he was here.  But it was going to raise a lot of questions that he just didn’t have time to answer right now. After all, this Marcus hadn’t seen Steve in years.  From the patch to the drug-seeking, not to mention how to explain showing up out of the blue knowing that Marcus was there in the first place, it was going to take too long to get what he needed if he went to Marcus today.  “Sorry, dude,” he muttered, “Kayla doesn’t have time for ‘This Is Your Life.’” 

No, the only options he felt he had were to either sneak in and steal them himself, which was a real gamble … or he could go to the source who originally helped him in the first place.  Alice Horton.

Chapter Text

Find Me
Chapter 26

Alice Horton was in the ER when the nurse waved her over.  “Yes, dear, what can I do for you?”

The newly minted nurse knew this was the wife of the Chief of Staff, and if the stuttering hadn’t have given away that she made the girl terribly nervous, the wide-eyed look on her face would have.  “Th-the fifth floor is paging you, Mrs. Ho—Horton.”

“Oh, she said with interest, “do you know what for?”

“She didn’t tell me,” the girl said.  “I’m sorry, I’ll call back right away!  Or, I mean, I can call down to you, I’m going there now to fin—finish out my shift!”

“No, I—“ she started, then turned sweet eyes on the girl.  “That’s alright, dear.  I’ll just head on up, myself.”  She felt sorry for the young nurse and wanted to try to ease some of her nerves, so she invited the young girl to walk with her.  “You know, you remind me so much of my granddaughter.”  It was the thick dark hair and doe eyes that had made Alice see so much Julie in her when she’d first spotted the new nurse this morning.  This explained to the young woman why she had been sweetly smiling at her all day, but it did nothing for her nerves.  Which is why when the menacing guy with the patch approached Mrs. Horton with such intensity that her attention was completely diverted away that it was like a weight had been lifted off her shoulders.  The nurse wasted no time busying herself at the nurse’s station hoping to blend in with the walls.

“Mrs. Horton,” Steve said with the strangest look of relief on his face.  Not just relief, something else was there, too.

“Steven!  What a surprise to see you, I hope you’re not sick.”

“No, I’m not—“

“Oh, I’m glad to hear that. If you’ll just excuse me, I was paged a minute ago.”

“Yeah, that was me,” Steve said as he started to bob back and forth on his feet.

“You?  Well, I— If not you, then who?  Not your mother I hope.”

“No, Mrs. Horton, look,” he said fixing her with a piercing stare that stopped Alice cold.  “I’m in something serious here, and you’ve gotta help me.  Kayla’s sick.”  Steve saw her eyes flicker with worry, and he took her hands in his in an effort to communicate just how badly he needed her help.  “Real sick.    I don’t know who else to go to.” 

Alice was stunned.  Not just with this news, but at the delivery of it; something seriously was not right.  “Well I heard she was ill, but do you know what's wrong with her?” she asked, looking around for the admitting team, which strangely seemed not to be there, then looked back at Steve.  “She's gonna be alright isn't she?”

“Not if you don’t help me, she won’t be, no,” he replied his eyes dark with worry.

Alice was taken aback.  “Steven, what are you talking about?  Which doctor is in with her?”

“No one, I didn’t bring her here.”

Alice took a beat to process that.  “I don't understand.  Why not?” she asked in utter confusion.  “She's sick, this is the best place in the world for her!”

“No, it's not,” Steve said, his desperation no longer idling just below the surface. He had to make her understand.  “It's too open, anybody could get to her here, she could die here.”  Alice’s mouth hung agape.  “Now you have to trust me.  Please,” Steve begged her, more with his eyes than his voice as he squeezed her hands.  “I’m begging you, please!”

Alice Horton was a fantastic judge of character, and ever since he had risked his life to save her from Simon Hopkins she knew two things to be true of Steve’s character.  He usually thought of himself last even when the people he was putting before himself weren’t paying him a bit of attention, and he was deeply in love with Kayla Brady.  For these reasons alone, she’d decided on the spot to help him.  But she was also terribly curious; something about him was off, and she had to know what it was.

“Steven.  I am not going to pretend that I understand what is going on, and maybe I’m not supposed to, but—well, something more is troubling you, I can see it in – that eye of yours.  Now what’s happened?”

Steve had no answer for this.  This is not how it went the first time, she didn’t ask him any questions.  He dropped her hands and reached up to adjust his patch.  “Mrs. Horton, I don’t know what you mean.”  He struggled to control his desperation and took a deep breath.  “Kayla really doesn’t have a lot of time to—“

“Alright,” she put up her hands yielding to him; she didn’t want to push, but she was sure something was odd here.  “What do you want me to do?”

Steve’s eye softened with relief.  Alice caught that relief and got a very strange feeling.  She got a sense that that eye had a wisdom that she’d never seen before in him.  A wisdom that only comes with years of seeing through it and living.  In that moment, Alice sensed the difference in the man standing before her, and what’s more, Steve could tell that she had noticed … something.

“There!” she pointed to him, “there it is again!”

Steve was alarmed.  It was like Alice could see right through him, into his thoughts, back through the jumps.  He looked anywhere but her eyes and went on the offensive. “Are you gonna help me or do I have to save her life all on my own, here!”

“Steven, calm down.  Come with me into the lounge here, and let’s talk.”

He felt an immediate panic that he was about to have to do some explaining that would land him back in the institution, a place he never wanted to revisit.  He needed Kayla.  He needed her to help him come up with the same kind of evasive answers that they both had given Marcus on their last jump.  I should have gone to Marcus.  “There’s no time, here, Kayla’s gonna die!”

Alice took Steve’s hand in her own, just as he’d done moments ago, and looked him square in the face.  “Young man, if you want my help, then you’re just going to have to trust me.  Now, I – We are going to take five minutes and talk.” 

Steve was helpless but to follow her into the lounge.  He had no idea what he was going to do, and all he could think about was Kayla suffering alone in that bed with no one there to be with her.  The clock was also ticking in his head.  He tried to calculate how long it was before he got the meds in her the first time, and he knew he was ahead of schedule. But he still didn’t have them in his hands and Gabrielle still hadn’t shown up yet.  

Now Alice poured Steve a cup of coffee and handed it to him with kind but no less determined eyes.  “Decaf.  I don’t think caffeine is going to do you any good right now.”

“No, look, Mrs. Horton, thanks, but I really don’t have time to—“

“Drink.”  Steve rolled his eye and took a sip of the bitter liquid, enjoying the feeling of it as it rolled down his throat.  Then he felt guilty that he was sitting here having a nice cup of coffee with Alice Horton while his wife suffered the effects of atropine poisoning alone. 

“Steven,” she said, “something about you is—why, it’s different.  I can’t put my finger on it, but I can see that you are troubled.  Tell me what it is, maybe I can help.”

“You can help me by helping Kayla,” he pleaded, “that’s all I need right now.  And I need it soon or she’s gonna die, Mrs. Horton.  She can’t die here.  I don’t know what would … how I’d … we’ve got to get home.”

“Home?  To Jack?”

“No!”  Steve was beyond frustrated, he didn’t know how to appease her, she just was so damned inquisitive, why couldn’t she just leave well enough alone!  He remembered how she loved a mystery and showed up at his apartment in her version of cloak-and-dagger-wear with her big glasses and hooded coat.  He smiled at the memory.

“Now, what’s so funny?” she asked.

“Nothin’, I’m just … remembering something”

“About Kayla I’ll bet,” she said with a knowing smile.”

“Yeah,” he replied, “about Kayla. 

Alice put a hand warmly on his arm and squeezed.  It was a surprisingly firm grip through the thick leather that covered it, and Steve felt oddly better with this small gesture of support, almost comforted.  It came with a giant wave of homesickness, but he found some solace in this woman who cared enough about him to try to not just help him, but to understand whatever it was that was troubling him.  And suddenly the enormous urge to confide in her hit him hard.  He wanted to badly to tell her what was happening to he and Kayla, remove this burden and let someone understand the weight he carried to the point where it was lighter.

But he couldn’t.  Perhaps if this was some other jump he could have tried, but the plain fact of the matter was that Kayla did not have time.  He had to get back to her with the meds and had to do it right now, before they jumped, before she … died.  He didn’t even know what would happen to his Kayla’s consciousness if a body she jumped into died.  He was terrified by the thought and shook it away.  But he did feel like he could tell Alice Horton.  That if he really needed to, he could go to her and explain, and that she wouldn’t run for the men with white coats when he was done.  For now, however, he simply had to get her convinced.  It was so much easier last time.  He had no idea how she could tell that he was different, but apparently the Steve he was today was not acting like the Steve that was supposed to be in this body.

“Look, Kayla and I have been through a terrible ordeal to be together.  There are things you don’t know that I can’t tell you.  Things about her marriage to Jack and what I did to make that happen that I’m paying for.  Now, I’m trying to fix them.  But someone in the Deveraux house is trying to kill her.”

“Kill her?”  Who?!”

Sure, what the hell.  “Senator Deveraux.  Now, I can’t go to the police, and I think you can figure out why.  Who’s gonna believe me, huh?” he asked tapping his patch.  “Now, I got her outta there, and she’s safe right now, but she won’t live without the medication I came for, it’s called physostigmine.”  Alice’s face changed from soft and supportive to suddenly wary.  “Here, I’ll write it down for you.”

“Now hold on,” Alice said with dawning realization.  “You want me to get you medication without authorization?”

“Look, I know it’s a lot to ask.”

“No it’s not.  You risked your life to save me from Dr. Hopkins.  I think I can bend some rules to pay that back.  Besides, I know you love Kayla.  And she’ll die without my help?”

“That's right.”

Then consider it done.

Steve put down the coffee and hugged her.  “Thank you, Mrs. H.”  He pulled back and wrote down the name of the antidote.  “How quickly can you get this to me?”

“Well, it helps to be the wife of the boss you know.”

Steve smiled again and wondered if that young lab tech ever got his promotion.  “Yeah, I know.”

“Stay right here, I’ll bring them to you.”

“Listen,” he warned her, “we’ve got to stay away from anyone in the Deveraux family, and especially their personal physician,” he mocked, “… I forget his name … I think it’s Jergensen.  And I need enough for two weeks, that’s how long it’s gonna take her to recover, ok?  Can you do that?”

The specificity of his knowledge did not go unnoticed by Alice, but she chose to just take him at face value right now.  Harper Deveraux always rubbed her the wrong way, and somehow hearing that he was behind Kayla’s illness didn’t surprise her.

“Ok, just wait here,” Alice said, then she left the lounge and disappeared into her task like a fairy godmother at the ball.

Steve now paced alone in the small room, looking through the window every minute or so to see if Gabrielle had shown up.  This was a bad place for him to be, because there was nothing he could do but let the people he’d gone to for help go ahead and help him.  He wasn’t good at relying on other people then, and while he’d certainly mellowed with age, he really wasn’t that much better at it now, either.  He felt like going to the meds closet and just breaking the door down like the Hulk on a rampage.  He’d be doing something, and it would feel good to finally expend his pent-up energy. 

Can we die here? 

Steve couldn’t help his mind from wandering to this question.  This was the first jump where one of them was in serious danger.  Twenty years ago, things could easily have gone the other way for Kayla.  If she hadn’t have dropped her pills in the limo on the way to her honeymoon … if she hadn’t have written him that letter that Melissa had given him at his sister’s wedding in Greece … if he hadn’t have gotten her out of that house in time … if he hadn’t have gotten her out of the hospital before Jack and his father had found her.  So many ifs, but ultimately, she lived.  Now there were no guarantees. What if their bodies did die here, what would happen to them?  Would their rightful consciousness die here, too, in the wrong timeline, or would it jump somewhere else? 

“None of it’s gonna stick, dude, remember that, it all just resets to what it’s supposed to be as soon as we leave,” he tried to reason with himself.  But something was stuck and wouldn’t let him accept it.  What if Kayla was right and that they just didn’t notice what changed?  “Nah, man,” Steve laughed mirthlessly, “I’m not gonna let her die just because none of it matters.  How do I know that if you die here that it won’t be all of you, huh?”  Now he just wanted to jump.  He wanted to get them out of there, and he was almost willing to take the chance of doing it separately just to get them out of this mess.  And the more he paced that empty room alone with his thoughts, the more he questioned what they thought about changing the timeline.  He was insane with worry, and it was affecting what he thought he knew.  Maybe we’re making changes, after all.  “NO!  I rearranged his fucking face!” Steve yelled to the empty room.  “I felt when I ripped his lip open!” 

“If he bleeds on my carpet you’re getting the cleaning bill.”

Steve whirled around to see Gabrielle standing with her hand on her hip holding out the house key with the other.

Steve moved his patch to ensure it was in place, then traced the strap along his brow line and took a deep breath. 

“Gabrielle,” he sighed heavily.  “Sorry, I, uh …”

“Rough day?”

“Yeah, somethin’ like that.”

“Mm-hmm.  Well, listen, I think the less I know the better.”  Steve nodded.  “Are you going to take it after all that, or did I drag myself down here for nothing?”

Steve pulled himself together and grabbed the key from her a little too forcefully.  “Sorry,” he said, “I’m … Sorry.”

Steve looked as strange to her as he sounded on the phone.  “Are you ok?”  She couldn’t help it.

“Yeah,” he grinned, “don’t worry about me, baby.  And I promise to get all that blood right out of your high-quality plush.”

Gabrielle wasn’t quite buying it, but she really didn’t want to invest in whatever he was dealing with, so she just nodded and smiled back at the fake one she knew he was giving her. “Alright, well good luck.”  She turned to go, and Steve grabbed her arm and swung her around.

“You’re saving someone’s life doing this for me.  Thank you.”

Gabrielle smiled then turned and walked out the door.  A few moments later, Alice walked back in.  Steve wasted no time on pleasantries.

“Did you get it?”

“Now, listen,” she replied, “I’ve done some research, and the dosage is one of these every day.”

“Right, I remember.”

“You do?”

“I mean I know.  I know, I really should go.”

Alice fixed him with a stern look.  “Atropine?”  Steve nodded.  No point in lying to her now.  “I really should be calling the police.”

“I’m not goin’ round with you on this again, if you don’t trust me, then I’ll just get them somewhere else!”  He didn’t yell at her, but he was done being calm.

Alice looked at him with severity as she reached into her pinstriper uniform and handed him two bottles of physostigmine.   “Alright, go.  Hurry.”

Steve’s heart soared as his hands wrapped around the life-saving bottles.  “You’re a beautiful person Mrs. Horton,” Steve said as he embraced her and kissed her cheek.

“And so are you, Steve Johnson.  Now go.”

Steve turned on his heel and started out the door, but not before he spotted Jack, Harper, and that quack doctor through the window.

“Shit!”

“What is it?” Alice asked.

“Jack and his daddy are right outside the door,” Steve whispered.  “Mrs. Horton, I’ve gotta get outta here or I’m gonna lose it!”

“Alright, I’ll get rid of them.  As soon as you get a chance, you get to Kayla.  Take care of her.”

With that Alice left the lounge and “noticed” the three men standing there.  “Why Senator Deveraux.  And Jack,” she said pleasantly.  “What can I do for you?”

“We’re looking for my wife,” Jack said, his worry apparent.  “She’s disappeared, and we were hoping that she’d have shown up here.”

“Well, I— good heavens, that’s terrible, have you checked with the receptionist downstairs?”

“Yes,” Harper said, “she said she wasn’t in the ER but that since she’s a nurse that she might be being seen by a doctor up here already.”

“Well, that may be, but I’m not aware of her being here.  Perhaps they took her down to the lab for some tests.”

“Jack,” Harper urged, “I think we should go to the lab right now and look for her.”

“Yes, of course!  Oh …” she trailed off.  “Well, visitors aren’t allowed in the lab, but I think in your case, we would make an exception, Senator Deveraux.  Now, may I take you to the lab personally?”

“Yes, thank you Mrs. Horton,” they both said with gratitude. 

“Oh, don’t mention it,” she replied.  “I’d do anything for Kayla,” she said more loudly for Steve’s ears.  Then Steve watched her lead them away so he could make his escape. 

Steve dashed out of the lounge and right into the opening elevator doors as if on cue.  Soon he was back on the road to Gabrielle’s house where Kayla lay waiting for him in her own personal poison-induced hell.

Chapter Text

Find Me
Chapter 27

The loneliness of the desert was oppressive, empty.  Kayla turned around and back again, and all she could see in any direction was waves and waves of untouched sand below a dark, moonless sky.  “Steve?” she called out.  She knew he wasn’t there, no one was there.  But she called his name anyway.  She did get an answer to her call, but it wasn’t Steve; it was of a baby crying.  “Joe!” Kayla yelled.  She knew the sound of her baby, and that cry was music to her hears.  She pined to hold him, nuzzle him, smell his baby scent.  She whirled around trying to find which direction the crying was coming from, but nothing was there amongst the rolling dunes and his cries surrounding her.  “Baby!” she cried, “Mama’s here!”  But there wasn’t a soul to be found as she turned in circles, and Joe’s cries were only getting louder.  So Kayla dropped to her knees, her white nightgown billowing around her, and started digging.  “Joey, where are you?!  Joe!!” she shrieked as the sand flew.  But with every armful of sand she cleared, the fresh clean waves would immediately replace it.  Finally, she gave up and hung her head as tears streamed hot down her face to be swallowed by the sand below her.   

Then the cries abruptly ceased, and she heard, “Mom.”  Kayla looked up startled to see Stephanie sitting cross-legged in front of her.  “What’s wrong?”

“Stephanie?” Kayla whispered. 

“Mom is everything ok?”  She was so calm as she tilted her beautiful, brown-haired head and looked at her mother with curiosity.

“Baby girl,” she hiccupped through her tears, “come here!”  Kayla’s tears turned to those of joy as she threw her arms around her daughter’s neck, only by the time they got there, Stephanie had vanished. The momentum of her attempts to embrace her daughter hurtled her forward, and she fell face first into the sand.  She sat up quickly and pitched her head back and forth looking for Stephanie, then turned on all fours to look in the other direction.  But she was gone. 

“No … noooooo.  This is … not real … this can’t … can’t be real!  Stephanie?  Come back!”  Kayla didn’t understand. She didn’t know where she was or why she was there, and she really didn’t understand what could be happening to her.  She was scared, alone, and terrified that she was never going to find her children.  “Steve …”  Then she fell onto her side on the sand and brought her knees up to her chest.  She squeezed her eyes shut, wrapped her arms around herself as she trembled with cold, and sobbed.

Steve could hear Kayla crying the minute he entered the house.  He sprinted the few feet to the bedroom and flew through the door to find Kayla tossing and turning in her sleep.  “Oh, baby.”  He put the bottles of life-saving medication on the nightstand, peeled his brown leather coat off, and let it drop to the floor as he made his way to sit beside her. 

“Baby girl!” Kayla whimpered as tears rolled out of the corners of her eyes.

“Kayla!  Kayla, wake up!”  She was moaning and breathing heavily as the sweat continued to bead on her very hot skin.  Suddenly Kayla started thrashing.

“No … noooooo,” she moaned.  “Can’t … real … come back …”  Steve tried to steady her from this nightmare, palming the hair back off her face. 

“Wake up, baby, come on,” he said as the sting began in his own eyes.  Steve took her limp hand from the top of the comforter and brought it to his face.  This wasn’t really how it went back then, and while he didn’t consciously know it, the touch of her hand to his cheek was more for his comfort than for hers. 

“Sweetness, can you hear me at all?” Steve soothed as he ran her hand up and down his cheek.  “Can you feel me here with you?  You need to stay with me, here, ok?”  He kissed her palm.  It was too hot.  “Stay with me, baby.”

Kayla heard her husband’s voice in the distance.  It was so crisp and clear in the numbing silence of the desert, but it was also faint and seemed impossibly far.  Still, at the sound of his voice, she stopped crying and just listened. 

“Stay with me, baby.”

Kayla sat up and opened her eyes.  It was dark when she’d last looked, but now the sun was shining, and she fought to focus against its brightness. The desert, however, was still there, pristine and combed to perfection.  She wiped the tears from her eyes with the heel of her palms.  “I’m here!” Kayla yelled.  “I don’t know where I am!”  He didn’t answer her.  “Come find me,” she said more softly.  “Please, Steve … please come get me.”

At that moment, Kayla stopped her thrashing and opened her eyes as the desert dissolved into the pale blur of the bedroom. 

“Steve?” she said through hazy eyes. 

“Yeah, it’s me, baby,” he smiled as he held her hand to his heart.  “I’m right here.”

She blinked slowly, trying to bring him into focus.  “… I’m,” she swallowed, “scared.  I don’t feel … good.”

“I know, honey, I know.  We’re gonna get you well, don’t be scared.  Don’t you listen to what those bad dreams were tellin’ you, baby.”

“Dreams?  Am I dreaming?” she mumbled.

“Not anymore.  We’re at Gabrielle’s, remember?”

Who?  She shook her head no and started to close her eyes again.

“No, baby, stay awake for just another minute, here, you need to take the antidote,” Steve said as he stretched his left arm over to the far nightstand to grab the medication.

Kayla felt him wrap his strong arms pull her up to a sitting position.  That act alone made her dizzy again, and she dropped her head to his chest, her hair caressing his neck.  Kayla was so confused.  Where was she?  Was she in an accident?  Was Joe with her?!

“Joe’s crying … I can’t find him.  Stephanie, too,” she started to cry.  “Don’t leave me.  Please don’t leave.”

Steve froze and looked down at Kayla.  His heart sank as he realized that she was delirious.  “Kayla,” Steve said firmly, “Joe and Stephanie are back home.  Do you hear me, they’re safe and sound.  We jumped here to 19 …” he had to think about it, “…87.  Remember, baby?  We’re jumping, but they’re safe in 2009.”

Like a switch, Kayla suddenly became very lucid, Steve’s words bringing her quickly into reality.  We jumped here.  The events of the past days and weeks rose to the top, but the fever dream lingered on the edge of her consciousness.  Still, the meaning of what happened here – that they jumped apart again and into a very sick body she couldn’t control – drove her, forced her to understand. 

“Steve?” she asked looking right at him, her glistening eyes clear.

“Yeah, it's me baby,” he smiled.  “Welcome back.  How you doin’?  Hey, how 'bout some water huh?” he asked giving her a chance to neither answer nor pass out again.  “It’ll go down real nice with that antidote, won’t it?  Yeah, sure it will.  Gonna feel a lot better real soon, baby.”

“I’m— Harper poisoned me.  We jumped to … Jack.  And the senator,” she said.  “You found me.”

“Oh Sweetness,” he assured her, “I’ll always find you, don’t you worry about that, now.”

Steve saw that her breathing was uneven, and he wasn’t sure how long till she was out again.  He had to get the pills in her.

“The kids.  Safe,” she murmured.

“That’s right, baby, now you’re makin’ sense.”  He laid her back down and reached for the pitcher he’d set up when he’d first gotten her settled.  The ice had all nearly melted, but he could feel the water was still cold as he poured it into the glass.  “Ok, let’s have some of this, Sweetness, swallow these down, now.  It’s gonna make you feel a whole lot better, you’ll see.” 

She was so sick.  Was she this sick last time?  Yes, she was.  Steve didn’t want to think about how he’d directly set these events in motion any more now than he did then.  So, like the first time, he just pushed past them and set to the task of getting the physostigmine down her throat.  

Sleep clawed at Kayla as she struggled to stay awake, but when she saw the two pills in Steve’s hand she knew somewhere in the back of that medical mind of hers that the dosage was too high.  “One,” she said.

Steve knew what she meant.  But he also knew exactly what he gave her last time and was not willing to chance what changing that might mean.

“We’re doubling the dosage for a couple days, baby. Worked last time.”

Kayla didn’t remember last time, so she just nodded and let Steve pop the small, chalky pills into her mouth.  She swallowed hard as she washed them down with the water Steve held to her lips, but they didn’t go down easily.  It was like swallowing sand.  She was so thirsty, she wanted the water, but her throat was so dry, it hurt to swallow it.

“No … it hurts.  Steve … I’m so thirsty,” she moaned as she jerked her head away, causing the water to spill over her chest and neck.

“Ok, baby, ok.”  Kayla had already closed her eyes, the desert sucking her back in.  “Since you already started on that sponge bath, I’m gonna go get that ready for you.  We’re gonna get that fever down, Sweetness.” 

Kayla didn’t respond, she’d fallen back asleep, which put Steve on edge.  He knew that sleep was what she needed, but he didn’t know if he could do this without her.  His mind was racing with what if’s that he needed Kayla to ground him against.  What if you die here?  What if I don’t remember what comes next?  What if someone finds us here?  What if I’m not careful enough? 

What if you die here? 

What if you die? 

“Kayla,” Steve called to her somberly.  “Please stay awake with me, Kayla.  I need you, baby.”  But his wife didn’t move.  In fact, she was so still, he had to watch her chest rise and fall to ensure she was actually breathing, which she was.  “I know you need to sleep, and that I’m – I’m being selfish.  But can you just please talk to me?  Stay awake with me?”  In answer Kayla said nothing and moved not a muscle.  Steve sighed and swallowed a lump in his throat.  “Alright.  You take a little nap.  You did that last time, too, you slept for days,” he laughed.  “So, that’s ok.  I'll just do the talking, how’s that?  Jack’s not coming this time, baby (what if he does?), it’s just you and me.  We’ve got spaghetti to eat.”

Kayla was back in the desert, still lying fetal, still alone, still scared.  Her nightgown reflected the sun’s rays in a brilliant and blinding glow that shone against the brown sand surrounding her.  She was so thirsty she could barely stand it.  She forgot where she just was, but it didn’t matter, because the baby was crying, again.  This time, he was right there, though, right in front of her sitting in his car seat. 

“Joe!” she said with a relief and happiness as she pushed herself up.  “Oh, I’ve been so—“ Kayla stopped short.  That wasn’t Joe. 

“Pocket?”  She was disappointed that this wasn’t her son, but she was equally happy to see the little boy that she and Steve had fallen in love with and wanted to adopt.  “Hey little guy,” she cooed through her bittersweet emotions.  “Are you thinking of me and Steve, little Pocket?  Do you need us, is that why you’re here?”  Pocket squealed, and Kayla smiled brightly.  “Come here, baby,” she beckoned as she picked him up out of the baby carrier and cuddled him close to her. 

Steve had found the same blue and white-enameled bowl he’d filled with cold water 20 years ago and filled it with that same cold water once again.  Then he got a washcloth and returned to Kayla’s side. 

“Hey Sweetness, remember this?” he asked setting everything down on the nightstand.  I’m gonna make sure that fever gets knocked right out of you.  Let’s unbutton this again, get you cooled down.” 

As Steve undid his wife’s nightgown, her breasts glistened with sweat just as her brow did.  He couldn’t believe how hot her flesh was.  He saturated the washcloth with the cold water and squeezed out just enough to ensure plenty of it was saved for Kayla.  Then he gently wiped the cloth down Kayla’s body with cooling strokes.  He started with her face, then moved to her arms.  When he slid the newly-dipped cloth down her chest, he was shocked at the very rapid rate of her heartbeat. 

“Baby,” Steve said with concern as his own heart skipped a beat, “you’re heart’s beating a mile a minute.” He bent his ear to her bosom to listen and was astounded at how fast it was going.  Steve put his left hand under her head and tried to make her see him.  “Kayla?  Kayla, I know how to get your fever down, baby, but what do I do about your heart rate?” She didn’t answer him, of course, and he sighed with renewed angst.

Steve knew she didn’t hear him, so he gently placed her head back on the pillow where it lolled to the side.  He didn’t know what more to do other than turn his attention to the washcloth and cool water.  “Ok.  That’s ok, I’ve got you.  This is gonna make you feel a whole lot better baby.  Gonna feel real good.”  Then he took the cold washcloth and ran it over her face and neck.  Then he redipped it, squeezed it out only slightly, and repeated it down her arms.  She let out little noises with the shock of the cold.  “Don’t you leave me, baby,” he said as he continued to her belly then repeated it all again and again.  “Don’t leave me.”

“We loved you, Pocket,” Kayla assured the baby boy in her arms, whispering close to his little head.  “We still love you.  I really do, baby.  I wish we could have kept you. We wanted to keep you.”  Kayla stood up and bounced him as she paced back and forth.  A lone tear fell down her cheek, and as if he understood with adult wisdom, Pocket reached his little baby hand up to that tear and wiped a cool hand over it, loving her back. “Thank you, baby,” she smiled down to him with love in her voice.  And then he was gone, her arms suddenly empty.  “Pocket?!”

As Kayla’s panic rose for having lost Pocket, she felt someone tapping her on the shoulder.  She whirled around and gasped.

Benji was smiling up at her. 

“Benji?” she whispered in disbelief.  “Oh my God, Benji …” 

“Hi Kayla,” he signed.  But Kayla had forgotten so much of her sign language, it had been a lifetime since she’d needed to use it.  Other than the sign for courage and the one-handed “I love you” sign, which she and Steve used often, she didn’t use it anymore. 

“Steve!” she yelled at the top of her lungs.  “STEVE!  Benji’s here?  We can see him again!”  She only absently realized that she didn’t know where she was, much less where Steve was.

Benji kept smiling up at Kayla, then he reached behind him and held his toy train up to her, the one that they’d bought for him when he was living with them.  When they’d had every intention of adopting him and making him theirs after the tragic loss of his mother and even more tragic discovery that Stefano was his father.  Kayla took the train and felt so much love for him.  Not a memory of loving him or knowing that she once loved him, but a real love that poured through her for him as he stood before her right now. 

“You’re with us in our hearts, Benji,” she signed.  I can sign, after all, she realized.  “You … are our family.  I miss you … I love you.”

Benji signed back to her that he loved her, too, and that he always knew she loved him.  “Like my mommy did,” he signed. 

“Yes,” Kayla signed back through her tears, “Like your mommy.”

“You were pretty, like her.”

Kayla put her head in her hands and wept for him.  He tapped her on the shoulder, again, and when she looked up Benji was grown.  Her surprise was so evident to the blonde man who was looking on with kind eyes.  He ran a calming hand down her arm, and she felt a kind of respite from the cooling comfort it brought.

“There ya go Sweetness,” Steve said as he ran the washcloth over and over down her body.

“Like your mommy,” Kayla cried, her eyes twisting into sorrow as Steve watched on helplessly.

“What’s torturing you in there, baby?  What have I done to you?”

Steve continued wiping her down.  Her arms, her chest, her face, the back of her neck, her belly.  There was no part of Kayla that wasn’t burning up with fever, causing her to continue calling out in her fitful sleep.

“Oh, baby, you're burnin' up.”  Steve had to get a hold of himself, he’d done this before, all he had to do was more of the same.  “Ok, it’s ok, I know you get better,” he said as if she was listening, “I just have to let you stay the course, here.  Just hang in there, Sweetness,” he said softly as he wiped her down and prayed.  “You hang in there, too, dude,” he said to himself.  “Don’t lose your head.”

Benji touched his fingertips to his chin and then let them fall to the palm of his hand. 

“Thank you?” Kayla repeated.  “For what?”

“For being a mother to me,” he signed.  “For wanting to be my mother.”

“I failed,” she cried.  “Your father eventually found you.  And – he – he …”  Guilt ran through her.

“No,” Benji snapped his fingers and thumb together while holding her chin in his other hand.  “You did everything right,” he signed.  “Thank you for saving me, Kayla.  You and Steve.”  Then he spoke, “I love you.”

“I love you, too, Benji.”

Kayla reached for his hand, just as he vanished.  She was alone again.  “Stop taking my babies away from me!” she shrieked at the sky, adding anger to the weeping sobs wracking her body.  Then a new set of wailing lungs lit up the very air around her. 

She looked all around her but didn’t see anyone.  She wiped away her tears and suddenly felt a coolness in her belly that felt good.  Instinctively running a hand over her swollen middle, she felt the familiar bump and looked down in surprise.

Smiling, she caught something glimmering out of the corner of her eye and turned to see Steve standing in front of her.   He was in his 30’s again, and he looked at her with love in his eye and a bundle in his arms. 

“Steve!  Steve, you found Stephanie!  You found her for me!  Thank you,” she reached out for her, “thank you!  Where did you find her?  Are we in Australia?”

Kayla took the infant from Steve and immediately saw that she didn’t know this baby.  It wasn’t one of her children, and it wasn’t one of her foster children.  But it was crying at the top of its lungs. 

“Who are you, little one?” she asked. 

At the sound of Kayla’s voice the baby immediately stopped crying and looked right at her with the quiet contentment of a child in its mother’s arms.  Kayla saw deep into the baby’s fiery green eyes and alabaster skin and knew right away that this was a girl baby and that she was theirs.  The cool comfort in Kayla’s belly continued, as she heard Steve call to her.  She slowly turned to find him standing before her.  He embraced her and their baby, then reached down to run his hands lovingly over her stomach.  They spread such love and cool contentment through her, even as she trembled from the cold.  But where he touched her, she felt good.  He kissed her head and their daughter’s, and he rubbed her belly in the way he always did when she was carrying his children.  “Am I dreaming?” she asked him? 

“Afraid so,” he nodded suddenly somber.  “Sorry, they have to go back now.” 

“They?  What?”

Steve reached for the baby, but Kayla held her close to her breast and placed a protective kiss on her ringleted hair.  “Don’t take her, please!”

The look on Steve’s face suddenly changed to one of fear.  “Please don’t leave me, Kayla.  Please don’t die.”

Steve and the baby vanished.  She felt empty.  Now she sank back down onto the sand that was, once again, reflecting nothing but darkness, the yellow sun, apparently, having dipped below the horizon.  She pulled her knees up tight and laid her head down upon them.  “Please, God,” she sent up softly to the heavens above.  “Please let me wake up.”

“… Australia …” Kayla babbled. 

“Australia?” he repeated as he halted his movements with the washcloth.  Steve didn’t like what he was hearing and could only assume that Kayla was having torturous dreams about when Stephanie was kidnapped.  “I did this to you.”  He bent down and lightly kissed her lips, then he laid his head down on her chest.  “I’m sorry, baby,” he whispered to her.  “It’s gonna get better, now that we’ve got the meds in you.  You’ll see.”

What he didn’t know was that it was actually about to get worse.

Chapter Text

Find Me
Chapter 28

Steve spent the rest of the night and the entire next day watching Kayla wrestle with whatever was inside of her.  She’d spend a few hours sleeping peacefully, followed by the next ones crying in her sleep as she thrashed.  She whimpered, she cried out, and she burned with fever.  How someone could be hot to the touch with sweat beading on her body while simultaneously shivering he didn’t know, but that’s what she was doing.  He had pieced together some of what she was dreaming; it killed him to watch.  She’d cry out for their children, call out in gibberish, then weep tears out of the corners of her closed eyes.  Once she begged him to bring her children back; it killed him.  He missed them, too, and every time she said Joe’s name a little piece of Steve’s heart broke. 

Something was terribly wrong, here.  This was not how it went the first time.  He remembered every bit of it like it was yesterday, and this agony Kayla was suffering?  The palpable sorrow that was wracking her even as she slept?  That was new territory.  It didn’t happen.  So why now?  He needed his wife so badly, he ached for her to wake up.  But he knew this was going to be a long haul if they were still even here that long, which he doubted.  She’d slept off the poison for nearly two weeks last time. She really needed to be in a hospital.

Steve did what he could to assuage her pain and try to comfort her.  He laid in bed with her just as he had the first time, adjusting her so she could lie against him.  “Take what you need from me, Sweetness.  Just take what you need,” he whispered to her.  He’d stroke her cheeks and hair, and he couldn’t seem to go more than a few minutes without placing healing kisses on her temple and top of her head.  She did seem to know when he was there, as her breathing would steady more when she felt his touch.  But the dreams did not cease as her anguish roiled beneath the surface.

By the evening of their second day Steve was exhausted.  Still he popped two more pills into Kayla’s mouth and somehow got her to swallow them down on the first try with the water he held to her lips.  Though it was one of her rare moments of lucidity, she’d initially refused any more water after she’d downed the medicine. 

“I don’t want it,” she whimpered.

“Sweetness, you’ve got to drink or you’re not going to get better.”  He sat her up with one strong arm holding her up while his hand supported her head.  “Come on now, Kayla, I’m not taking no for an answer.”

Kayla’s throat still hurt from the dryness, but she obediently tried to drink it.

“That’s my girl,” Steve said like a father proud of his baby eating her strained peas.  “How’s that feel?”  Kayla grimaced as the glass shards she was sure the water was laced with scraped down her throat.  “Not so good, I guess, huh, baby?”

She shook her head no and got an annoyed look on her face.  Steve thought that was a good sign, annoyance was better than grief. 

That’s when Kayla felt nausea well up deep from the pit of her stomach. Suddenly a very coherent Kayla looked at Steve with big eyes and reached up to grab his upper arms.  “We’re jumping!”

“What?!” Steve gasped.  “I don’t feel it yet, wait for me!”

“I’m gonna be sick,” she said as her gorge rose.  “I wanna jump … ungh …,” she moaned.

“Hold on, baby, we’re getting out of this mess!”  Steve clutched her to him, “I’ve got you, baby!” He waited for the room to fade around him and smiled with utter relief that this nightmare jump was ending.  Please get us home!  Kayla tucked her head into Steve’s shoulder waiting for the jump effect to get worse.  She felt his hand lay protectively on the back of her head and said a prayer that she’d see Joe and Stephanie. 

Nothing happened.

When Steve opened his eyes, he saw the same gold sconce holding a royal blue candle that he’d just seen moments before.  Kayla was still in his arms, still moaning, still in Gabrielle’s bedroom, still in 1987.  He pulled Kayla from him, and she turned her big eyes on him, so dilated that they obscured most of her normally bright cornflower blue irises. 

“We’re still here … aren’t we?” she asked with loathing, the nausea not having passed.

“Afraid so,” he said looking around. 

Afraid so, Kayla remembered from the night before.  Sorry, they have to go back now.

With what little emotional strength she had left about shattered, she began crying again.  From the memory of her fever dreams, to the situation they were in, to how ill she felt, to watching Steve have to manage it all by himself – all of it.  Only she had no moisture in her eyes to do anything more than wash over her lashes as she placed a latent hand over her belly.

Steve didn’t grasp any meaning in her actions at all, simply looked down at her in bitter disappointment that they were still there, as well as, frankly, exhaustion. 

“I don’t think that was the jump, Sweetness, I think you’re just still,” he sighed deeply, “real sick.”

She stared at him and saw how drained her husband was.  How hard he was working to keep her alive.  And she felt a stab of hatred for whomever or whatever was doing this to them.  Steve was on the very edge, she could see that, and all she wanted to do was hold him.  Comfort him.  As he’d been doing for her.  Steve saw it in her expression even amidst her tears and just smiled sadly back at her. 

“It’s ok, baby.  I know,” he said

“I’m so sorry, Steve.”  She’d stopped crying, leaving her eyes swollen on top of everything else.

“Shh.”  He placed his fingers to her lips.  “Get well.”

“I wanted … to go,” she said softly through her queasiness.  “Why aren’t we jumping?”

“Me, too,” Steve replied.  “I wanna jump out of here.  Home.”  He cupped her face in his hand and just looked into her helpless eyes.  “We’re bound to jump soon, we’re due, don’t you think?”

Suddenly Kayla felt a wave of nausea and knew this one wouldn’t end well.  “Gonna throw up …,” she mumbled through clenched teeth just before Steve watched her turn an unmistakable shade of green.

In record time, Steve was up, stripped back the covers, and lifted her out of the bed into the bathroom.  He got her there just in time for her to begin mostly dry heaving; there was nothing in her body to throw up.  Nothing but the pills, unfortunately.  Though this body hadn’t eaten solid food in days even before Kayla had jumped into it, the water and medicine had, indeed, come up, and now Steve wasn’t sure if he needed to re-dose her or not.  Again, this was not part of the drill back then.

Steve kneeled down next to her, soothing whisps of hair that had come loose from her clip back from her face until she collapsed down next to the toilet against the tub.

“I’d ask if you’re ok, but you’re not.”

“Huh-uh,” she shook her head. 

“Baby, you threw up the medicine.  You’re the doctor, do you need to take more?”  Steve was frustrated despite his best efforts.

Kayla’s throat was on fire, she didn’t want to have to swallow anything, but she knew she had to dose up again.  “Yeah,” she sighed.  “Need water or I’ll get sicker.”

“Just noticing that, are ya?  Why do you think I’m trying to pour it down your throat?”

Kayla peered over to her husband with that annoyed look again.  “I’ll try to do better,” she said without feeling.

Steve was immediately sorry for his tone.  “Sweetness,” he said taking her in his arms as they sat on the floor.  She was cold and clammy from the vomiting, and he was reminded of just how wrong this whole jump was going.  “I’m sorry, I’m not mad at ya, here, I’m just … not taking this well,” he said as he dragged his hand over his face.  “It’s not the same as last time.  You don’t remember that, I know. But it’s not going the same.  You had the fever, and you slept for days, but these nightmares, baby, you didn’t have those last time.”

Kayla squeezed Steve’s arm “It’s ok,” she said faintly “you’re taking such good care of me.  I’m sorry we’re here.”  She started feeling weak again and didn’t have the energy to really register what Steve had just said about it being different this time.  She was dizzy and tried to fight the sleepy feeling that started to crawl up her spine.  “I’ll drink.  Better get the phys.”

Steve got Kayla back in bed and watched her down a whole glass of water with the medication.  She was still hot to the touch.  And her eyes were quickly getting unfocused again.

“Steve?” she called out as she slowly blinked her eyes.

“Right here, Sweetness.  Not going anywhere.”

“Steve …,” she reached out for his hand, which he took into his own.  “Thank you for taking care of me,” she said overwhelmed with emotion as tears again pooled her red-rimmed eyes.

“Baby,” he said with love in his voice, “that’s what I’m here for.  Besides,” he said with a chuckle, “I don’t have a choice, I got nothin’ without you.”

“I love you.”

“I love you, too.”  Steve ran his thumb over Kayla’s dry lips and cringed inside. 

He saw that she was about to check out, again, and before he could say another word she was back in la-la land.  Steve joined her for four solid hours before the nightmares began again. 

Later that night, Steve couldn’t ignore the hunger that had overcome him.  This body hadn’t been fed in at least 48 hours, as there was next to nothing in Gabrielle’s kitchen.  He’d been fighting with himself on this, knowing there was no way around it, but he was going to have to leave again.  The downright fear of jumping without her or her getting into some kind of trouble when he wasn’t there gripped him and prevented his feet from leaving that room. But he had to eat. And, to be honest, so did she. Eventually, she was going to have to have something more than water, even if it was just soup.  There were also no clothes for either of them there, and sitting around in the same shirt for however much longer they had here was not going to be great.  So, at 10pm, he kissed Kayla and told her that he had to go get them food and clothes and that he’d be back.  With worry gripping his heart, he walked out the door and drove to a dock quite a distance from his apartment, as he knew his place was being watched by the Deverauxs.

Steve was glad that he and the bartender, Joey, had become friendly over the years, because when he appeared in the kitchen of Shenanigans, the staff was confused.  He’d convinced them to just get Joey in there, and when he appeared, he was nothing but happy to help his friend.  He put together enough takeout to last for possibly a week – more than enough for both of them – along with the promise to keep his mouth shut. 

“Hey man, you were never here,” Joey said.  “I don’t even know your name.”  Steve thanked him with a thump on the back and a $20 tip up front.  He deserved it.  It was two huge shopping bags full of soup, sandwiches, and what seemed to Steve to be half the menu, really. 

While Joey was getting that together, Steve snuck into his apartment and shoved a bunch of clothes for himself and what he could manage for her into a duffle.  He grabbed a harmonica, too.  Then he picked up the food, paid Joey with the cash he luckily had in his wallet, spotted and avoided a Deveraux goon, and ran back to Kayla as fast as he could.  She was exactly as he’d left her. 

Steve snuck in a sandwich then ate a second; he didn’t realize just how starving he was.  Shortly after that he tried to cool her down with another sponge bath as she slept fitfully, and then spent the rest of the night in and out of his own sleep with the cycle of her nightmares.

Now on the morning of their third day, Steve woke up to Kayla sleeping soundly for a change.  He said “thank you” out loud, kissed her forehead, and headed in to take a quick shower.  He saw her wedding ring sitting previously unnoticed around his neck when he took off his shirt.  “Sweetness …”  He brought the solitaire to his lips and kissed it.

Steve went back to her bed and sat down.  “Kayla,” he said wrapping her fingers around the ring on its chain, “you need to get better so I can get this back where it belongs.  You hold onto that while I’m cleaning up, ok?  Till then, how ‘bout we get rid of this one.”

He easily slipped off the marquis and wedding band from Kayla’s left hand and was surprised that he’d not noticed it there yet.  “Guess I’ve been preoccupied,” he said.  He wanted to hurl the rings out the window like he’d done twice before, but this time he just set them down on the table and went in to shower. 

Several hours later Steve tried to get Kayla to eat some soup with her meds, but she barely woke enough to take the pills with water, let alone actually eat soup, so Steve ended up eating it instead while Kayla continued to sleep off the atropine.  She actually seemed worse this day, rather than better, because she wouldn’t take any liquids, and the dehydration started taking its toll.

On the morning of the fourth day, Kayla woke up long enough to appease Steve and eat some soup, which she threw right up.  Other than a few sips of water with her medication Kayla took in nothing and simply slept.  The nightmares, meanwhile, got worse.

“What am I doin’ wrong this time, Kayla?  Why is this happening?” 

What he didn’t know was that it wasn’t him, it was Kayla.  She knew deep down that she needed to just sleep, but her brain was so active with anxiety that her body was unable to shut it down with the rest of her. She was subconsciously thinking all the time about what was going on, why they were jumping, why they jumped there, and, above all else, who was taking care of their children.  Was Stephanie alright?  Was Joey getting what he needed?  Concern for their kids was always just under the surface whether she was consciously thinking about them or not.  Their children weren’t a glimmer in her eye the first time Steve had rescued her from the Deveraux house, but now that they were, and now that they were jumping, Kayla couldn’t turn her mind off.  That’s why her nightmares were so chaotic and so gut-wrenching.

By the afternoon Steve knew she was in trouble.  He’d tried to rouse her several times to get her to drink or go to the bathroom, but the fact was that all the fluids she had her body was sweating out in an effort to deal with the fever.  He was able to get the meds in her, and there were brief moments of success in getting her to drink water, but not without a serious effort to get her cooperation.  She hadn’t gone to the bathroom at all, she continued to sweat, her lips were dry and cracked, and she was completely pale.  She might be the doctor in the family, but Steve knew that these were all signs of serious dehydration. 

Finally, as the sun had sunk into mellow blueness of the night, Steve was at the end of his rope.  He needed her to take her meds, but she was pushing him away in her sleep, jerking her head back and forth as he tried to coax the water past her cracked lips.  He remembered that this was about when he’d started to panic last time and that Marcus had said that she was doing great and that sleep was what she needed.  But she wasn’t going through these nightmares last time, she wasn’t so dehydrated last time, and the thought of manipulating a “random” meeting with Marcus this time seemed almost impossible.  He just inherently knew that this was his last chance before he was going to start losing her. 

If there was a rock bottom in this situation, Steve had just hit it.

“Goddammit, Kayla!  You wake up, and you drink this water!  You think it hurts now, just wait till you’re dead, baby!  If you don’t get some water in you you’re going to dehydrate.  You’re a doctor, you know that!  And then where will we be, huh?  Back in the hospital, that’s where!  And out of ways to avoid the Deverauxs!  I’m not losing you, baby,” he said as he cried, lifting her to his chest and stroking her hair even as he uttered the harsh words.  “Now wake the hell up!”

Kayla laid on her back in the dark of the desert.  She placed a protective hand over her belly and began singing.

“You are my sunshine, my only sunshine.
You make me happy when skies are grey.
You’ll never know, dear, how much I love you.”

Steve sat at her side holding the green-eyed baby girl with the soft light curls.  Kayla looked up at him and finished the song.

“Please don’t take my sunshine away.”

Steve kissed their daughter in his arms, then placed a possessive hand on his wife’s abdomen and bent down to place a soft kiss there.  She shut her eyes tightly, opened them again, and he was gone.  Kayla didn’t bother crying, she had no tears to shed.

Steve then appeared on her other side, and he was suddenly angry.  “Goddammit, Kayla!” he yelled at her while holding no green-eyed baby.  His eyes were blazing, and she was so alarmed by his anger that she blinked hard.  When she looked back at him, he was crying.  “I’m not losing you baby, now wake the hell up!”

The light hurt her eyes, as Kayla opened them slightly.  They started to tear, and those tears joined the ones caused by Steve swearing at her. 

“Why are you mad at me?” she cried, not quite awake and still halfway talking to the Steve in her nightmare.

“Kayla,” the Steve at her bedside softened slightly, “Oh, Sweetness … baby … It’s been four days.  Please.  Please help me, here, Kayla.  I’m gonna lose you here in the middle of the wrong time if you don’t start drinking.”  He was stroking the hair off her forehead and tucked bits behind her ear. He kissed her cheeks and then kissed them again.  “I can’t do this without you.  Please be awake long enough to take a good long drink with your antidote.  Please, baby?”  Now Steve started openly weeping.  “Please …” Kayla stroked his arm with her thumb, “this isn’t like the first time.  Just take these, ok?  Drink something for me?  For Joe and Stephanie?  Please …”

Kayla was fully awake now, and through the haze of not knowing for sure what was real and what was only a terrible fever dream, she reached for her husband’s head, which was pressed against her breasts crying. 

“How long?” Kayla asked.  Had she really heard four days?  They’d been here four days?

“We’ve been on this jump four days.  That’s how long we’ve been here at Gabrielle’s house,” he said, afraid to hope that she’d stay awake for a bit.  “It’s been two that you’ve barely had anything to drink, and I can see your body starting to shut down.”

Kayla was very alert now.  And worried about the state Steve was in.  “Did I sleep through it?”

Steve wiped his sleeve across one cheek, then the next.  “Yeah, baby,” he chuckled, “you could say that.”

Kayla felt herself slipping back to sleep just like that and forced herself to focus on taking her meds.   She saw the two pills in his hand and said, “Just one, now.  I only need the one.”

“Baby, are you sure?”

“Yeah,” she said with a hoarse voice, “you’ve been giving me two a day for four days?”

“three, this is the fourth dose, not counting re-dosing you after you threw up the other day.”

“Just one now.  It’s ok.”

She tried to take the pill from his hand, but her weakness did nothing for her dexterity, so Steve popped it in her mouth and put the other one back in the bottle.  Then she held the glass to her lips and she drank the whole thing down with a grimace.

“How about another glass?”

“N—Ok,” she said when she saw the look of sheer fatigue and weariness in Steve’s eyes.  “You getting any sleep?”

He wanted to assure her that he was fine and that he was getting plenty of rest, but the truth was written all over his face. 

“God, Steve, I’m sorry,” she croaked.

“Baby, just drink this up and don’t apologize. This isn’t your fault.”

Kayla drank the water.

“Should I get Marucs?” Steve asked sullenly.

Kayla shook her head.  “We’ll jump soon, right?”  Then it hit her and her eyes grew to the size of saucers.  Steve noticed that her eyes weren’t dilated anymore and felt a small measure of relief.  “Four … days?!”

“Yeah, four.”

“We’ve never been anywhere for four days.”

Steve had already reached this epiphany on day three.  He’d been waiting to jump for hours, all senses on alert for the signs.  None of which had come. 

“I don’t know why we’re still here, baby, but I can tell you that I’ve been out of my mind.  You have no idea how bad you’ve been.  I … I think we should call Marcus.”

“I just need to sleep the poison off.”

“Ok,” he relented, “but I need you to try to have some soup.  Can you do that for me?  I’ll make it real quick if you promise not to go anywhere.”

Food was not sounding good right now, but Steve was haggard, and she needed to do it for him.  “Ok, maybe a sip or two.  So tired, though.”

He kissed her and said he’d be right back.  Five minutes later he was back with a mug of chicken noodle soup.  He was amazed that she was actually awake when he got there and that he didn’t have a fight on his hands. 

“I wanna sleep, Steve, please.”

Maybe a small skirmish, then.

“Just eat this up, baby, then you can sleep again.”

He settled for five bites and half a glass of water before she passed back out again.  But Steve’s faith had rallied.  He took her hand in his, kissed her fingertips, and placed her palm over his heart.  Then he realized he’d forgotten to give her her ring while she was still awake.  He cursed under his breath and lifted the chain over his head. 

“Kayla,” he said to her sleeping form.  “I forgot to do this, but let’s get this ring back on your finger.  I don’t want to wait anymore, baby.”  He kissed the ring, slipped it on her finger, and then got in bed next to her and snuggled her up against him.  “I do, Sweetness.  Forever, I do.”  He kissed the top of her head and sighed.  He was so tired.  “And ya know what, baby?” he asked closing his eye, “I know you do, too.  In sickness and in health, right?  I’ll never leave you, Kayla.  Please don’t leave me.”  In only moments Steve fell asleep holding his wife beside him, both of them resting peacefully as they turned the corner in to the fifth day of this horrible jump.

Chapter Text

Find Me
Chapter 29

The cool breeze felt like heaven.  It kissed at her naked body sending waves of relaxed contentment through her.  When Kayla opened her eyes, she was surprised to find that the desert was gone.  Instead she found herself laying in their bed from the house in the in the open air of the park.   She should have been self-consciously trying to cover herself up in public, but somehow she wasn’t.  She sat up and wanted nothing more than to feel the sun on her face.  When her feet hit the grass she relished the feel of it as she walked the few steps to the park bench.  She didn’t call for Steve or look for her children; she knew they weren’t there, because she knew she was dreaming. 

Which is why she let out a startled yelp when someone squeezed her shoulder from behind.

“Hey baby.”  Steve’s eye sparkled with mischief when she whirled around. 

“Steve!  You’re here?”

“I’m always here.”

Kayla smiled.  “Yes you are,” she said.  “And you’re you again.”  She reached out her hand to touch his 2009 face and felt contentment at her fingertips.  “Am I me again, too?”

“You’re always you.”

“I mean, am I old me again?”

“Shh.”  Steve held out his arms to his wife, and she walked into his embrace, feeling his naked body on her skin.  It was warm and comforting and made her feel safe.  There wasn’t a single thing that felt as good as Steve’s body next to hers, and she melted into him.

“I know I’m dreaming, but you feel so real.”

Steve ran his hand down her back and let it settle on her behind.  She felt his soft kisses like feathery touches on her neck. 

“Make love to me.  I want you to make love to me.”

Steve lifted her into his arms and carried her back to their bed.  “You’re not well enough for that yet, Sweetness, and you shouldn’t be out of bed.  But I’m with you.  You know I’m here taking care of you.”

“I feel fine now, look at me, I’m fine, I’m back in my own body.  Please make love to me, I need to be with you.”

“Kayla, I am with you,” he said as he laid her in the bed and leaned her up against him.  “But you’re still sick.”

“But I feel better.”

“Better and well are two different things.”

Kayla was confused and disappointed.  “I don’t feel sick anymore”

Steve looked at her with a gentle smile.  “You are.  I’m taking care of you.”

Kayla decided that this was her dream and she didn’t want to take no for an answer.  “I love you, Steve.  I want you to feel how much.”  She moved over to straddle him on her knees and felt his familiar hardness between her legs.

“Kayla, don’t you want to do this with the real thing?”

Kayla felt rejection radiate from the pit of her stomach as the sky above them darkened. 

“You don’t want me?” she asked in a small voice.

“There’s nothing I want more than you.  But you don’t have to do this to feel me, to keep me with you.”

“I’m afraid,” she said.  I’m afraid of what’s happening and that you’re going to disappear or—or—that I am, that we’re never going to see our family again.”  Then she laid herself down on top of him resting her head in his neck.  “I’m scared of what’s happening to us.”

“You should be,” said a new voice from behind them.

Kayla quickly darted under the covers just to realize that she was suddenly wearing her white nightgown again. 

“Don’t bother hiding yourself, I can see everything, anyway.”

“You—you can?”

“Yeah, but don’t worry about it.”

Kayla looked around, and as she’d feared, Steve wasn’t there.  “Steve!  Where are you?!”

“He’s gone,” said the disembodied voice.  “So go ahead, what do you want to ask me?”

“Ask you?  Who are you?”

“I’m Al.”

“Al.”

“Yep.  What can I do for you?”

“I don’t know,” she said with frustration, “you’re the one who just showed up!”

“No, you conjured me.”

“I ‘conjured’ you?”

“Yep, sure did.”

“What you’re a … a … figment of my imagination?”

“I guess so.  Your husband mentioned me.”

“He did?  Right … he did.  That show.  That one about setting things right?  I don’t know that show.”

“It doesn’t matter. So, c’mon, let’s talk. What do you want to know?”

Kayla threw herself out of the bed and paced.  “I want to know what’s happening to us!” she yelled.  “I want to know why we’re leaping through time!  I want to know where my kids are!  And …,” she said more softly, “and who that baby was …”

“That it?”

“Yeah, for a start,” she said matter-of-factly as she ran a hand through her short blonde hair.

“Well, I think you know who she was.”

“No I—I don’t,” she insisted without much conviction.  “Do, ah … do I?”

“Yeah.  You do.”

“But she was taken away.  The others, too”

Kayla let out another yelp as Steve, once again, startled her with a hand on her shoulder.

“Hey baby,” he said.

“Oh great, what is this, we’re going to do this again, now?”  Steve looked at her blankly.  “If you’re not going to be real, then go, I’m tired of this!”

“Kayla.”

“I want to wake up!  This isn’t real, and I want the real Steve, I want my Steve, any real Steve.  I want my children!  I want to go home!”

“Ah, my two lovebirds.  Star-crossed, such as you are destined to be, eh?” 

Kayla’s skin crawled at the sound of the voice coming out of the man now standing in front of her and Steve.  She hated that voice, and grabbed Steve’s arm, the fact that she was dreaming not diminishing her fear-laced hatred.

“S-S-Stefano.”

“Of course.  I am offended, Kayla, that you even have to ask.

Kayla fell to her knees and started to rock.  Steve kneeled down behind her resting his hands on her shoulders.  “It’s ok, baby,” he said.

“Oh, but it’s not,” Stefano said in his faint Italian accent.  “I’m not going to be satisfied until I ruin every Brady that lives.  Kayla, you still live, so I am not done yet.”

“You already took my husband for 16 years!  What more can you do to us!” she screamed.

“He was a good soldier for a while, but eventually I had to sell him.” 

“Noooo,” Kayla moaned as she held her palms to her forehead.  “Not real, he’s not real.”

“But I am, my dear.  And you have children, no?  They’re Bradys.  Ah yes, I do believe I have plans for them.”  Stefano’s laugh was pure evil.

Kayla stopped rocking and looked up at him with eyes that were as dark as the menacing clouds overhead.  “I’ll kill you first,” she seethed.  “Once and for all, I will kill you.  For taking my husband, for tormenting us when you took Joe, for killing –“ tears spilled from her eyes – “for killing Benji!”  She launched herself at Stefano and started hitting him, pounding at his face, kicking him. And all he could do was laugh at her feeble attempts.

Eight relatively quiet hours after he fell asleep, Steve awoke to a hard kick in the groin.  When he opened his eyes, he groaned and instinctively tucked his knees up into his chest.  “Kaylaaaa,” he groaned, “Uhhh.”  Then he fielded a punch that would have landed right in his ribs if he hadn’t rolled away; instead it connected with the strong muscles in his back.  “You’re dreaming, Kayla … ugh, Jeez …” his balls were screaming.  Not in a good way.  The next kick landed on his ass.  That’s enough of this, now.

Steve straightened out painfully, willing the throbbing in his balls to wane and grabbed his wife’s wrists in both of his hands.  He then rolled on top of her to safely nullify her kicking legs as she twisted beneath him.  He was frustrated, hopping mad, and he wanted her to stop.  His anger ebbed, however, when he felt how cool she was to the touch now.  “Baby,” he said as she continued to fight him, “I think your fever broke.”  He put his cheek to her forehead and smiled.  “Kayla, baby.  Thank God.”

Kayla was crying and flailing, her hoarse voice not quite letting her say the words he could see her trying to form.  “Kayla!” he yelled.  “Kayla wake up!”  Steve took her chin in his hand and shook.  “Wake up now!”

When Kayla’s eyes snapped open, he saw that they were clear and alert.

“S-Steve?”  She reached her hand up to touch his scar.  “It’s you?” she croaked.

“Yeah, Sweetness,” he relaxed some, “it’s me.”

“Young you,” she said glancing around.  “We’re not home yet.”

“No,” he sighed, “we’re still at Gabrielle’s.  You were having a hell of a dream there.  But your fever,” he smiled gently, “your fever broke.”

Kayla was disoriented but her mind was clearing quickly.  “I’m still sick,” she said.

“You sure as hell are, baby, giving me the scare of my life.”  He rolled over on his back and pulled Kayla against him.  She tucked her knee up and grazed Steve’s groin, making him recoil.  She lifted her head and looked at him quizzically.  “It’s ok, baby, ya just kind of … got me in your sleep.”

“Got you?—Oh…,” she realized.  “Oh, Steve, I’m – I’m sorry.  Did I hurt you?”

“Well, baby, it didn’t tickle,” he said sitting up to get a good look at her.  “Whoever you were fighting I think you won.”  His quip had the opposite effect he intended and immediately felt bad at the look of remorse on her face.  “Oh, don’t worry about it, Sweetness, I think he’ll be ok.  I’ll even let you kiss it and make it better as soon as you’re well again,” he smiled.  He glanced at the time and said “You need water.  Are you hungry, baby?  Can you eat something for me?”

Kayla did feel a little better, but she was still exhausted.  “I’m so tired.  Dizzy.  But thirsty.”

“You slept more than a week last time, Kayla.  This is only Day 5.  Last time on Day 5 you were still sleeping.  This is different.”

“Different how?”

“Nightmares, getting dehydrated.”  He didn’t want to scare her so he didn’t elaborate. 

“Did I dream a lot last time? I don’t remember having dreams then.” 

“No, not like this.  Kayla, it’s been real bad, I thought I was gonna lose you for a minute there.”  I don’t believe you’re talkin’ to me like this finally,” he stroked her cheek and smiled.  “This is the first time you’ve seemed to improve at all.”  She looked at him with love in her eyes as she heard the emotion in his voice.  “I—I—,” he took a deep breath, “Kayla … I’m so happy to see you, Sweetness.” 

“Me, too,” she said.  “My dreams … they’ve been – awful.”

“Tell me.”

“’They were like chaos.  Our kids.  All of them, Pocket and Benji, too.”  Steve’s eye flickered.  “They’re taken away.  You … took them away.”

“Me?  Baby I’d never do that, you know that.”

“I know, it’s just a dream, I think it was more of a – a symbol.  Trying to tell me something.  It felt real, though. It felt so real.”

“Yeah, sure did,” Steve laughed as he pulled her to him, the pain in his groin having faded to a dull ache.

“And there was another baby, too.”

“Whose?”

“I … I think she was ours.  Not Stephanie or Joe.  Another one.  I think I saw our baby, Steve.”

Steve froze.  “What are you talking about?  We have two kids”

“And Pocket and Benji.”

The mention Benji’s name cut Steve to the core and he fought hard with the muscle in his jaw.

“And now the baby girl with the green eyes and light curly hair.   It was reddish, like a strawberry blonde,” Kayla said with a kind of reverence as she layed in his arms.  “And she looked at me with your eyes.  She was ours, Steve,” she said as tears stung her eyes.  “I … I don’t really remember it all, but I remember her, and I remember how she looked at me, and how you looked holding her.  You loved her so much.”

“Kayla—“

“I think she’s the baby we were meant to have if you hadn’t been taken away from us.”  With every passing moment, Kayla was sure that the dream she had was showing her something real. Something that was supposed to have been real. 

Steve, however, was not taking this well.  All Steve ever wanted for them was to live in that big house and fill it with kids.  Lots of kids.  Three, four, whatever got thrown at them. He wanted a house full of them.  He wanted to be a father to children he made with Kayla, raise them with love, play Patchy Claus with them every Christmas, and watch them each grow up calling him Papa.  To hear about the baby she thought they were supposed to have but were cheated out of put him in a dark and depressing place. He rolled away from her and got out of bed.

“Steve?”

“No more, Kayla,” he said darkly.

“But—“

“I said no more!” he roared.  “I don’t wanna hear any more of this!  We have two kids, Kayla, two.  We almost had two more, one was taken away and one was killed by his own piss-ass excuse for a father!  Now I can’t listen to any more of this!  You had a dream.  Terrible nightmares.  I know how you’ve been suffering, ‘cause I’ve been living them with you for five days!”  He saw the look of hurt on his wife’s face but shoved past it, unable to deal with the loss that was spreading through him like a cancer.  Because the truth was that he believed every word she said.  “Now I’m going to make you something to eat, ok?  You gonna be alright here?”  He didn’t wait for her to answer, he left the room quickly and headed for the kitchen.

Kayla couldn’t help the tears that streamed down her face.  She’d laid too much on him.  His nerves were shot having to deal with her in the state of delirium that she knew she must have been in for five solid days (I can’t believe we’ve been here for five whole days), and now she goes and tells him that there’s a child they never got to have?  She felt so selfish as she wept into her pillow.

Steve leaned against the counter gripping it hard as he tried to deal with this.  But when heard the sobs he couldn’t stay put.  He ran back to her, gathered her up in his arms, and cried with her.  “I’m sorry, Sweetness,” he cried, “I didn’t take any of that well.”

Kayla was dizzy and would have fallen back to sleep if she wasn’t so distraught.  “No, I … I’m the one … who’s sorry,” she said.  “I laid all that on you after so much stress.  I’m … I’m …” she couldn’t get the words out.

“I feel cheated, Kayla!  We’ve been cheated out of our family.  Our home.  I have so much hate inside me for the people who have come between us!” He hissed.  “I feel the hate.  It eats me up, baby.  I don’t know what to do with it.”  He still had her in a fierce embrace, and Kayla rubbed her palm up and down his back.

“Forgive … me,” she cried with him.

My God.  How could she have loved me so much, he wondered.  I make her cry … our whole lives I push her away and give her to men that rape her and lie to her, and she’s asking me to forgive her.  

“Kayla, I’d die without you.  There’s nothing you could do to make me stop loving you.  There’s nothing to forgive, baby.  Nothing.  I’m the one that needs forgiving.”  He took a deep breath and held her away from him.  “Tell me more about your dream.  About – the baby you dreamed about.”

But Kayla had grown tired, the sobs taking all the strength she’d gained for the time being.  “Have to sleep,” she said. 

“No, Kayla, you need to eat, honey, please.”

“O—Ok.  Ok.”

“I know what would make you feel better, how ‘bout a shower, huh?  Or a bath?  Let’s give it a try.”

Steve spent the next hour keeping Kayla awake, getting her in the bath, washing her hair, and getting her into one of his clean shirts and pair of boxer shorts.  It was hard for her to focus, and she dozed lightly a couple times before she found herself back in bed, her damp hair loose about her face.

“Look what I’ve got here, Sweetness,” he said with a smile, “more soup.  Your favorite, chicken noodle.  Joey gave us plenty to eat, but the soup is starting to run low.”

“Joey?”  The mention of her son’s name awakened her a bit.  

“No, Sweetness, not ours.  The bartender at Shenanigans.”

“Oh.”  Then it dawned on her.  “Wait … did he come here?”

“No, I had to go there.  I’ve already left here twice,” he said.  Kayla looked at him with shock in her eyes.  “You don’t know how hard it was, Sweetness.  But I had to get you the antidote and get us fed, and I couldn’t take you with me.  There was no other choice, I had to take the risk.  So far so good.”  Kayla nodded in understanding and took the soup that Steve offered.

“Feeling like you’re gonna keep that down?” he asked.

Kayla really did feel a little better. The light didn’t hurt her eyes, and though she was still dizzy, she wasn’t really nauseous.  “I think I might,” she said.  Then she spied Jack’s wedding ring on the table.  She looked immediately at her left hand and saw her own ring back where it belonged.  She looked at him questioningly.

“I married you again while you were sleeping,” he smiled.  “I hope you don’t mind I couldn’t wait any more.  Said your ‘I do’ for you.”

Kayla smiled.  “I’m glad you did.”

Steve fed her some more soup, and she laughed as she looked at her hand again.  “How many times now, four?”

“As many damn times as it takes, baby, that’s how many.  You’re stuck with me.”  Kayla smiled.  “In good times and in bad, Sweetness.  Like now, this is a really bad time.  So, tell me about our … daughter.”

“No, it’s—“

“Tell me about the baby, Kayla.”

Kayla took his hand, and for the first time since jumping into this poisoned body, she felt well enough to continue talking.  She told him as much as she could remember about her nightmares.  About the desert and how their four children would come and go, and about the agony of having them taken as soon as they arrived.  She told him again about the green-eyed baby, and this time Steve didn’t run away. 

“I know she’s not real, Steve, but I felt her.  And I was pregnant, too.”  Steve looked up, and his eyes went wide.  “I don’t know with who, but you kissed my belly and rubbed it with so much love.  It was beautiful.  I felt so much love.  And then you’d all disappear again.  Over and over again.  And I was empty inside.”

“I’m sorry, Sweetness.”  He couldn’t help the sense of loss that wrapped its dampening sadness around his heart.  Even so, Steve was elated when she finished the whole bowl of soup and an entire glass of water as she told him about the dreams.  “You know what, baby, you’re looking a little tired.”  And she was still terribly pale, too.  “I think it’s time to go back to sleep.  Unless you’re feeling like throwing up?”

Kayla’s half-mast lids were about to betray her, but her stomach was behaving.  “No,” she mumbled.

“Ok, good, here take your meds.”  She took the pill from Steve’s palm, herself, and swallowed it down.  “Sweetness, that’s an improvement!  I think you’ve really turned a corner here.”

Kayla was fading fast.

“I love you, Kayla.  Just rest up, I love you.  Thank you for not leaving me.”

“I could never leave you,” Kayla said as she signed “I love you” back to him.  Then she closed her eyes and fell into a peaceful, dreamless sleep.

Chapter Text

Find Me
Chapter 30

Kayla never felt so glad to be hungry.  Staring into the nearly empty refrigerator, she knew she was nearly well again.  Not perfect, but well enough to wake up to Steve sleeping like a rock beside her, kiss him on the forehead, slip out of bed to shower on her own, and pad off to the kitchen to address the hunger making itself known in her stomach.  And she was thankful for it.

Unfortunately, there wasn’t much in the fridge left to eat.  In the last two days, she and Steve had gone through most of the rest of what he’d brought back from Shenanigans, leaving a few withered pickles, several rolls, and some crackers.  Not much to dine on; but standing in her bare feet with the cold air of the fridge radiating over her while she wore a pair of Steve’s boxers and one of his button-down shirts, she felt alive.  She felt happy, clean, and well.  

She was also confused.  How was it that they’d been there seven days without a jump?  Never ever had they been anywhere this long, and it was like a bit of validation that they couldn’t be careless during these jumps and get complacent waiting to jump.  She’d been thinking about it non-stop for two days and just didn’t know what to make of it.  When she woke up this morning, she’d finally succumbed to the fact that she had to go to the bathroom.  She’d felt a little stronger every day, and this day she was feeling a lot stronger; so much more like herself.  So, she willingly left his sleeping presence to go take care of herself.  It was the first time she’d done so since they’d jumped here, and it was the first time that she’d allowed herself to be alone.  It wasn’t as hard on her as it was on Steve when he had to get her medicine and food, because she knew he’d already done it and they were still there, so she figured the likelihood of a jump happening when she was peeing was probably slim (or that’s what she told herself, anyway) and, therefore, allowed herself to deal with her basic needs.

Now her trip to the kitchen was like another milestone.  Looking back at Steve before she left the bedroom, he hadn’t moved, and after the ordeal he’d been through like a new father with an infant, she didn’t want to inflict any more sleep deprivation on him than she already had.  Be a big girl, Kayla, go to the kitchen, she thought.  The bathroom was a baby step, the shower was the next one, and they were both still there.  Steve snored lightly as she crossed that threshold into the living room and walked alone into the kitchen.  She wished she could say, piece of cake, but it was unsettling, and she wanted to get back to the comfort of her husband quickly. 

Still, the life she felt from her bare feet to the mostly dried curls in her hair was wonderful.

Kayla grabbed two rolls, filled two glasses with water, and headed back to the bedroom where Steve continued to sleep.  She set it all on the nightstand and crawled back into bed.  She grabbed her roll and tore off a piece with her teeth as she leaned on her side watching him sleep.  He still hadn’t moved. He was that exhausted.

“You love me that much,” she whispered as she caressed the hair off his face, “that you nearly kill yourself to keep me alive.”  

She couldn’t bear to wake him, so she kissed his cheek and got back out of bed to sit by the fire.  The flames had started to ebb, so she stoked it, adding a log to the glowing embers, then sat in a nearby chair and let herself be lulled by the flames.  As she tore off more pieces of her roll, she wondered what would have happened if he hadn’t saved her all those years ago.  She’d be dead now.  What would have become of Steve?  Would he have gotten over her?  Her mind wandered as the what-ifs ran through her head one after another.  She thought about where her family might be today if she had died all those years ago.  Would Steve have found a way to be happy, maybe with someone else?  Could he have moved on?  “I didn’t,” she said softly. 

Unbidden, guilt and inexplicable jealousy ran together like a cold stream down her spine.  Shame as she thought of how she tried to move on with Shane along with resentment for the nine women Steve slept with while he wasn’t himself erupted like a conflagration as she stared at the fire before her as she saw Ava in her mind’s eye.  She shuddered and mentally kicked herself.  “Stop it,” she said.  She knew these thoughts were completely irrational, so she shook them off as quickly as they’d come to her.   It was only a moment, and it was only one in a sea of thoughts that would run through her mind that night, not the least of which being why they had to go through all of this again in the first place.  That was a thought she was truly sick of having.

Kayla sat like that for some time before Steve stirred.  She didn’t notice when the bedcovers rustled as he sat up against the headboard, she’d been so lost in thought.  He was so glad to see her out of that bed, he didn’t want to say anything just yet.  He just watched her as the flames reflected their golden light against her face.  Her hair glowed even more brightly than it usually did.  She was so beautiful.  And she was well.  Thank God, she was well. 

“Nice to see you up and around, Sweetness,” Steve finally called out to her softly.

Kayla turned with a start and saw that he’d been watching her.  “Nice to be up,” she replied with a smile.  “I hope I didn’t wake you.”

He just smiled at her, silent.  Then he glanced at her empty side of the bed and said, “I must have missed you.”  Then he raked an eye over her and laughed. 

“What?” Kayla asked with a smirk.  She knew exactly why he was laughing.  “You did this on purpose, didn’t you?  Wanted to see me in these ridiculous boxers again.”

“Yeah, that must be it, baby,” he chuckled.  “Stand up, let me look at you.”

Kayla rolled her eyes but complied just so she could hear him laugh some more.  Steve whirred his finger asking her to turn around, which she did, flipping up her shirt tails and sticking her butt out. 

“Yes,” Steve said, “very nice Santy Clauses on that very nice ass, now please come here and warm me up.”

“Wait a minute,” Kayla said with her hand on her hip, “You want me to get back in the bed?  I finally got out.”

“Would you get your ass in here, please?”

“Ooh,” Kayla teased, “testy.”  She crawled back into bed and laid her head down on Steve’s chest as he embraced her tightly.  

“Mm, baby, you smell good.”

“Amazing what a little shampoo will do for you.”

Steve sighed deeply as his demeanor shifted to something more serious.  “You don’t know how happy I was to see you sitting in that chair just now, Sweetness.”  Kayla didn’t say anything, just let him hold her tighter.  “You scared me so bad.  It was way worse than the first time,” he said as he kissed the top of her head.  “I didn’t realize it could get worse, ‘cause that was bad enough, but it was, baby.  I wasn’t sure—“ he paused, and Kayla turned her head to place a kiss on his tattoo.  “—I wasn’t sure you were gonna make it for a while there.”

“Shh,” Kayla said, looking up at him.  “I did make it.  Here in this crazy timeline from so long ago I can’t believe you even remembered any of it—“

“Baby, I couldn’t forget it.”

“—And you saved me.  You somehow found me the antidote without even going to Marcus, I don’t know how you did it.”

“You can thank Alice Horton for that, Sweetness, you might be dead right now if it wasn’t for her.”

“You, Steve,” she said seriously.  “You.  Are the one who made it all happen.  And I’m here.  I’m ok.”  She leaned over and kissed him softly with her full lips that had gotten back all of their color.  “I love you.”

“Baby,” Steve raked his knuckles down her cheek.  “I love you, too.”  Then he realized it must be evening by now and said, “speaking of the antidote, you need to take a pill now.”

“Already did,” she said sticking her chin out.  “Right before I went into the kitchen to look for something to eat.”

“You went to the kitchen?  By yourself?”

“I know,” Kayla said with wide eyes full of faux awe, “shocking, but true.”

Steve smiled at her as she sat up in bed and faced him.  “Weird, wasn’t it?”

“It … was hard.  I’m worried about separating, but you did it, and we’ve been here so long that I just thought … it was time.”

“You know, leaving you here about did me in.  I just had to hope we wouldn’t jump.”

“Well not going wasn’t much of alternative.  And look, we’re still here,” she smiled.

“Seven days, Sweetness,” he said solemnly.  She nodded.  “Long time.”

“I know.”

They looked at each other, silently agreeing to table the why that they both ached for the answer to. 

“So, you’re feelin’ good enough to look for food, then.  That’s great, baby, I’m so glad.”

“Me, too.”

“Did you find anything?”

Kayla shrugged.  “No, actually, not too much.  We’ve got a few rolls left, and lots of crackers, Joey seemed to really want us to have a lot of crackers.  And some pickles that have seen better days.  And that’s about it.  I brought you some dinner over there,” she said nodding toward his nightstand.

“A whole roll?  A whole one?”

“Yep. Already had mine, so that sucker’s all yours.”

“Ooh,” Steve said, as his eye went wide with excitement.  “Goody.”

Kayla smirked then got a little dizzy, the effects of the atropine not yet fully gone from her system.  Steve caught it and dispensed with the mirth immediately. 

“Ok, back to bed for you, come on now, lie down.”

“Steve, no, I’ve been in bed for a week, I really don’t want to lie back down.”

“It took two weeks last time, Kayla, and you just had a dizzy spell, you’re not 100%.”

“Steve, no more coddling, please, it’s not a big deal, I was dizzier with my pregnancies than that last blip, really, I’m fine.”

Steve cast a concerned glance at her from his side of the bed.  “Alright, you’re the doctor, but I’ve got my eye on you, baby.”

“Ok, I’ll take your eye on me any day,” she grinned.

She looked so beautiful.  Her young face and silly outfit only made her look better, and Steve suddenly had an urge to devour her. 

“Ok,” he said brusquely, “my turn in the shower.”  He turned quickly and headed for the bathroom and felt bad.  Here his wife was just finally well again, and the first thing he thinks about is making love to her.  Nice, Johnson, real nice.  “You gonna be ok in here while I shower?” 

“I think I can manage,” she said in a slightly lower voice, enjoying the effect she was having on him as she licked her bottom lip.

“You’re still a sick puppy dog, Sweetness,” he warned.

Kayla sat back against the headboard with mock disappointment.  “You’re no fun.”

“Oh, that’s just cold, now, baby,” he said as he headed for the bathroom.

As the water ran over his naked body, Steve ran the soap over his skin.  Normally, he’d be thinking sexy thoughts about what he wanted to do to his wife in that bed out there now that she was so much better; but despite the playful flirting of moments ago, his thoughts were filled with caution.  Relief.  Fear.   Much like his wife had done earlier in the evening, Steve thought about what they were doing there seven whole days after their jump.  Why they hadn’t jumped yet.  And what the hell they were doing there in the first place.  As the shampoo rinsed though his hair and down his back, possessive need started to flicker and quickly grew to needing to have her in his arms.  He needed to feel her body against him.  Needed to feel her heart beating with his.  It was a need driven not by sex, but by fear of the uncertainty that they were facing. 

Steve turned off the shower, wrapped a towel around him middle, and without even putting his patch back on, he burst into the bedroom.

“Kayla!”

“Steve?”  She was surprised that he emerged without his patch, it wasn’t like him.  “What’s wrong?” she asked as she put his roll back on the plate; she couldn’t help it she was so hungry.

“I need to hold you, Sweetness.  I need you.”  He pulled her up off the bed and brought her into a tight embrace, he didn’t care that he was getting her all wet, and neither did she, he felt so good.

“What is it?” she implored.  “Tell me.”

He pulled her head up to his and covered her lips with his own.  It was the first passionate kiss they’d had since they’d jumped here.  It was fierce and wet and frantic, and it took her breath away. 

“Steve!”

“No!  Kiss me.  I need you.”

His tongue dueled with hers, and she felt his arousal stiff against her belly as hers moistened the boxers she wore.

“I’m here, baby,” she assured him.  “I’m right here.  I’m fine now.”

That made Steve stop and smile.  “Fine, are you?  You’re fine?”  That brought Steve back to some kind of rational sanity.  “Oh baby,” he chuckled.  “What kind of fine was that kiss? Tell me it was more than a 7.”

Kayla was dizzy again, mainly but not entirely from the kiss, and didn’t get the reference.  “What?  Seven what?  You’re not done kissing me, are you?”

He saw her sway and said, “Jesus, I’m an asshole.  You were not ready for that.”

“Stop it, you’re not, and I was, I’m ok!”

“No, you’re not, come here.”  Steve got his wife back down on the bed, and she admitted to herself that that was maybe too much too soon.  “Baby, I just panicked in the shower, I can’t explain it.  I just needed to feel your skin on me.  I needed you.  Sorry.”

“I’m not,” Kayla said, reaching her hand over to stroke his naked erection, the towel having fallen away. 

Steve groaned as pleasure coursed through him.  “Kayla, I don’t think you’re well enough for this, I shouldn’t have come out here guns blazing like that.  Oh … oh, baby, you need to stop.”  She was looking at him with love in her eyes, and he tilted his head in question at her.  

“You took care of me for a week, Steve.  You didn’t sleep, you didn’t eat.”

“No, that was you, baby.”

“And you suffered by yourself while I slept it all away.”

“Nightmares don’t count now?”

She was still stroking his penis, wanting to give him release.  “While I slept it all away, Steve.  Let me make you feel good.”

“Baby, I want to make love to you, I said next time I’d really make love to you, but you’re not ready.”

“No, but I can still make you feel good.”

And her hands did feel good.  Soft and skilled as she worked his powerful erection in her hands.

“Are … are you sure, baby?”  Steve had started to pant as the sensation of her hand pumping fast over his cock.  “You don’t … have to … I … I want to wait for you.”

“Shh,” she said as she placed wet kisses on his neck while her fist worked to bring on his release.  His right hand threaded through her hair as he held her tightly with the other.  “I love you, Steve,” she cooed in his ear.  “I love you so much.”  Steve cried out her name as his orgasm exploded in her hand.  “I can’t wait to feel you inside me.  Soon.”  White hot streams pumped over Steve’s belly and onto his chest as she suckled his neck and found her way to his lips.  “I love you.”  She kissed him gently, sweetly.  When he pulled back, he saw only devotion in her eyes. 

“You’re somethin’ else, Kayla, you know that?”  She kissed him again.  “You didn’t—“

“I know I didn’t.  I wanted to.  I wanted to.”

“Thank you, baby.” 

After he cleaned up, dressed, and put his patch back on, he and Kayla both sat in front of the fire.  They were both hungry, and they knew that there was really no way out than for Steve to leave again.  Kayla couldn’t go with, because if she was spotted, they’d have to navigate the whole thing with Jack again, and neither one of them had the energy to figure that all out again.  So, he got on his shoes and jacket, kissed her deeply at the door, and went on his third trip without her. 

There wasn’t anything at his apartment he needed, so he headed in the opposite direction out of town to a food store and stocked up on real food.  His money was running low, and this was probably going to be the last time he’d be able to buy anything without hustling some pool.  He got basics, lunch meat, bread, soup, eggs, fruit, and frozen vegetables.  Before he checked out, he ran back for pasta and some jarred sauce.  “We’ve gotta have spaghetti.”  He ran through a McDonalds on the way back for a quick meal tonight, then flew back to the cabin. 

When he walked into the bedroom she wasn’t there.  Fear gripped him.

“KAYLA!”

“I’m right here!” she said from behind him.  “I was in the kitchen, you ran right past me.”

Relief flooded his every limb.  “Kayla,” he said with a bit of annoyance as he plowed a hand through his hair.  “You scared the shit out of me.”

“Sorry,” she said gently.  “I was just getting some water.”

“Ok,” he reached for her, “It’s ok.  Whoo!” he laughed.

But the truth is that none of this was funny, and it was time to really talk.  They sat down at the table across from the bed, and Kayla began to inhale her quarter pounder.

“It’s nice to see you have an appetite again.”  Then he looked at her seriously, his big mac still in his hand.  “This was close this time, Kayla.  We almost didn’t make it out of this one alive.  You know that, right?”

“You mean I didn’t.”

“I was there, too. If you had died, I would have died with you.”  Kayla put his free hand to her face and turned her lips in to kiss his palm.

“I do know that.  And we’re still in it.  Tomorrow is eight days.”

“Baby, what’s even more crazy is that I don’t get why we’re here.  Not just jumping, but why we jumped here, Kayla.  If it was to put right something that was wrong the first time, then why jump to now?  What the fuck were we supposed to fix here?  What I did wrong that got us here I did wrong months ago, so why not jump there and fix that?”

Kayla thought about what he was saying as she popped some fries into her mouth.  He was right.  If there was purpose to these jumps, then the others could maybe be explained. This one, however, didn’t seem to fit the mold.

“I mean, what was this whole thing for?  So I could watch you have nightmares?  So, you could almost die?  So, I could worry every second I was away that we’d jump while I was gone?  We should have jumped to the night I was going to propose to you.  That’s the night I needed to fix.  A week ago, on that ladder while you were already halfway to your grave?  What was the point?  What was the fucking point of reliving this, Kayla?”   He was riled up now and tore into the rest of his big mac.

“Maybe there’s not a point at all,” Kayla said.  “Maybe that’s the answer is that there’s no actual point.”

“Wha?” he asked with a mouth full of hamburger.

“We’ve been comparing our jumps to TV shows and science fiction.  But those things are fiction, don’t you see?  Maybe what’s happening to us is just random.  No purpose to it.”

“Nah, baby, I can’t believe that.  This isn’t normal stuff, here.  Middle-aged us going all Invasion of the Body Snatchers with young us?  That sound normal to you, Kayla?”

“Obviously not, I never said it was!  Steve, we’ve been struggling to find something familiar to explain all of this, and what I’m saying is that maybe we’re not supposed to set anything right and there’s some other thing going on.”

Suddenly, Kayla saw Stefano in her mind’s eye, laughing at her, telling her that he has big plans for her children.  The color drained from her face.

“Someone’s doing this to us, Steve,” she barely whispered, pushing her fries away.  “This isn’t an accident.  This is Stefano.  I know it.”  She watched her husband’s reaction carefully.  He was still and silent.  “I dreamed it.”

“You dreamed a lot of things, Kayla, you dreamed your children were right in front of you.”

“Yeah!” she said, “I did!  And I dreamed they were taken, which they were.  Because we were taken from them.  First he took you, now he took both of us.  He said—“

“In your dream?  You’re telling me what he said while you were having fever dreams, baby?”

“Yes, but—“

“Nah.  Kayla, no, come on now.”

“Would you stop shutting me down!   You want these jumps to make sense, well you can just forget it, ‘cause they don’t.  Jumping through time is not something that can be made to make sense, it can’t be explained.  But I’ve seen some impossible things that Stefano made happen—“

“Yeah, he and that witch doctor of his.”

“—and if he could make John think that he was Roman so perfectly that he had his own sisters and brother and parents fooled, and if he could make Hope believe that she was someone else for so long, and make you forget who you are …” Steve bristled.  “… then who’s to say that he’s not behind this, too.  Maybe he wants us to suffer. Maybe he’s trying to kill us, abandon us in some time that we can’t find our way out of.”

Steve was still stuck back on “forget who you are,” and his face darkened.  “I’m sorry I forgot you, Kayla.”  His voice was a ragged whisper.  Then he pounded the table and yelled, “I’ve hated myself every day for doing that!”

“No!”  She took his hand in hers and ran her hand through her hair, “It’s not about blaming you; I don’t, you know that, and I don’t want to have to tell you again.  It’s about the impossible things that man has made happen.”  Steve let her squeeze his hand in hers and stroke this one insecurity he had left about them, the fact that Stefano found a way to break him.  “And I believe my dreams were telling me something.  About us, about our … baby … and I think Stefano is doing this to us.”

 Steve exhaled with frustration and shoved himself against the back of the chair.  He fumed as he eyed her unfinished fries and asked, “You gonna eat that?”

“Help yourself.”  She smiled as he wolfed them down. 

“What are you grinnin’ at, baby, I’m hungry.”

“Some things never change, Steve Johnson.  Always stealing my fries.”

“Hey, you were done with ‘em.”

“Yes, I was.”

They looked at each other and smiled.

“You turn me on when you’re yelling like that,” Kayla said.

“We don’t need Stefano, ‘cause you’re gonna kill me first.”

They cleaned up dinner and played several rounds of gin rummy with the deck of cards Steve had found in the living room.  They sat on the floor on either side of the small coffee table as the snow fell outside.  Eventually, Kayla started to feel like she couldn’t stay up another minute.  And they headed to bed.

“I feel like I just woke up,” Steve said.

“You did, it hasn’t been that long.”

The lights were out as she snuggled against him, the cooling embers of the fire glowing softly across the room.  Steve placed a finger under his wife’s chin and pulled her lips to his.  He reveled in the feel of her lips on his.  He could kiss those lips all night as they turned their bodies to face each other so they could continue simply kissing each others’ warm, soft lips. 

“Think we’ll be here in the morning?” Steve asked between kisses. 

“Yeah, I think we will,” she said. 

They laid like that for quite a while, kissing deeply and lovingly, like teenagers in love.  And it felt good.

*   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *

The numbers were shocking.  They streamed in, and he didn’t know what to make of them.  It wasn’t quite going according to plan.  It was almost going even better.

Chapter Text

Find Me
Chapter 31

This time Steve knew he was dreaming as soon as he heard her voice.

“Steve?” 

“Yeah, baby?” Steve replied with a content smile on his face. 

“Open your eyes.”

“I don’t wanna wake up yet.” He could feel that he was in their bed at the mansion, and it felt so right.

“Trust me.  Open up.”

Steve did as his wife said and immediately connected with the deep green eyes of the baby laying in Kayla’s arms.  She was standing before him in their bedroom wearing a long, flowing nightgown, her hair secured in a headband.  Steve watched as Kayla lowered her smiling lips to the baby’s shock of red curls to place a kiss upon them; watching this action brought him an overwhelming peace that made him feel as if he glowed from the inside out.

“I think she wants her papa,” Kayla said.

“Her papa wants her, too,” Steve replied as he stood up.  He looked down at the infant girl in her mother’s arms and ran a fingertip down her porcelain cheek; it was smooth and plump and undeniably of him.  “You look just like your mama said you would,” he whispered to his daughter.  Steve offered her strong little fingers his own to grab on to.  He kissed her hand when they did and felt a protective pride surge through him.  “The Littlest Sweetness is a strong little baby, isn’t she?  Yes she sure is.”

“Want to hold her?” Kayla asked.

“Can I?”

“Of course, she’s your daughter.”

The happiness and contentment coursing through Steve was as real as the bed his actual body was sleeping in at Gabrielle’s.  It may have been a dream, but he knew he was looking at the baby girl that Kayla dreamt about, too.  He closed his eyes with a deep sigh, then reached his arms out to take the little girl.  When he opened his eyes a second later, they were gone.  He didn’t even have time to react to their sudden disappearance when seconds later, a small voice rang out behind him.

“Hi Papa,” the little girl called to him.

 He turned toward the bed to see a girl of about four looking up at him.  Her fiery red was attached in pig tails to the sides of her head, green eyes exactly like his own staring at him with mischief.

“Well now.  What’s your name?”

“Papa!” the girl scolded, You know my name!”  The girl giggled and said, “I’m Emily.”

“Emily,” Steve whispered.  He smiled knowingly and shook his head in awe.  “Well … that’s a beautiful name for a beautiful girl.”

Emily giggled some more and then looked meaningfully at Steve.  “Your eyes are my eyes.”

“My eyes?” he asked, confused.  When he reached up to fix his patch, he realized it wasn’t there.  Of course, it’s not there, dude, you don’t usually dream with it.  “My eyes,” he said realizing.  “That’s right, your mama said you had my eyes.” 

“I do,” said the little girl matter-of-factly.  “She says there’s a baby in her tummy, too.”

“What?” Steve said as Kayla re-appeared, embracing him from behind.  “Sweetness?” he asked as he whirled around to face her.

“I’m pregnant,” she said lovingly as she placed Steve’s palm on her swollen belly.

It was the most natural and beautiful thing his wife had ever said to him.  It was a regret he’d always silently harbored.  That with Stephanie and Joe, he had to find out about them in crisis situations.  Even before he was ready to have kids, he dreamed of the perfect moment when the woman he loved would tell him that she was going to have their baby.  He wasn’t such a tough guy about that, he wanted the ideal “I have something to tell you” moment like everybody else.  But he never got it.  Until now.  In this dream.  He knew in that moment that none of this was really happening, but he was overwhelmed with joy, anyway.  It felt real, he wanted it to be real, and the pounding of his heart as it swelled with love he couldn’t contain couldn’t possibly have been more real. 

Steve fell to his knees and ran protective hands over the child nestled in his wife’s belly.  Kayla stroked his hair as he laid his cheek upon her and felt his unborn child’s movements.  There wasn’t room inside his heart for all the love he felt.  And even as he dreamed, a memory came to him of another time he thought Kayla had been pregnant. 

“I look at you sometimes,” she had said, “and I love you so much that I feel that I don’t have room inside for all that love.” 

“I feel the same way,” he had assured her.

“Don’t you want to do something with it?” she asked?  “Don’t you want to give it to someone?”

He did.  He wanted to give it to this baby beneath his cheek.  And the one standing beside him.  And the two he’d left behind at home.  And the amazing woman that was his whole life standing before him.  He looked up at Kayla’s beautiful blue eyes and said “I love you, Kayla,” before placing a kiss on the swell of her tummy.  Then he looked over at the pony-tailed girl who was beaming back at him. 

“Come feel this, Emily,” he said to her as the baby continued to kick.   “Mama’s gonna have a gymnast.  How does that sound for a brother or sister?”  Then he took the tops of Emily’s hands in his palms and ran them over her warm belly for his daughter to connect to her sibling with.  “That’s what having children is all about.  Can you feel all that love in your heart, Littlest?”  She nodded at her father.  “Sure you do.  I know you do,” he said kissing her head. 

Embracing his wife, his daughter, and his unborn child all at the same time, Steve was … happy.  He was incredibly happy.  So happy, in fact, that when he felt himself waking up, he was too content to get upset about it.  

Kayla continued to stroke her husband’s hair and tilted his chin up toward her.  “We love you, too, Steve,” she said to him. 

He knew he was about to wake up, and Emily seemed to sense it, too.  “When will I see you again, Papa?” she asked without sadness but, rather, with anticipation.

The next time I close my eyes, Littlest Sweetness.  I’ll see you then, ok?”  Her red curls bobbed as she nodded her head happily.  “I … I love you, Emily.”

“I love you, too, Papa.”

“Hmm …,” Steve sighed as he opened his eye to the dark room he’d fallen asleep in still here in 1987.  He turned over and reached across the bed covers for the dark form soundly sleeping next to him.  He remembered every part of this dream very clearly, feeling all the happiness now as he had then, and wanted to share it with her, tell her he saw their child, too.  “Baby?  You awake?”

Kayla’s sleeping form didn’t reply with anything more than the sound of her even breathing.  He scooched close to her while bringing her rear into the crook of his lap.  She felt good against him.  He buried his face in her hair and held her tightly against him.  When she stirred, he didn’t feel bad for waking her; he wanted her to feel him holding her, and he wanted to be held back. 

Facing away from him, Kayla mewled sleepy sighs and hugged his embracing arm to her chest.  “Perfect fit,” she whispered softly as she rubbed her rear against him. 

Steve’s body reacted immediately.  The feeling of him going hard against her bottom awakened her a bit more.  Not enough to stay awake, but enough to make her want to feel his teasing lips against her neck. 

“Oh, Sweetness.”  His breath warmed her ear.  “I had the best dream, baby.”

“Mm?” Kayla hummed with a sexy tone.

Steve chuckled.  “Not that kind of dream.”

“Aw,” she feigned disappointment, “too bad.”  Then she placed the hand she was still hugging to her chest over her breast.  Steve squeezed it and rubbed his thumb over her nipple.  In response, she rubbed her ass harder into his groin.

Steve was quickly losing the determination to tell her about his beautiful dream as his wife continued to tease him in the twilight of her sleep.  “Tell you what, Sweetness, how ‘bout I tell you about it when we’re both a little more awake?”  Then he pressed his palm into her breast as he ran wet kisses down her neck to the spot on her shoulder that always made her moan.

Steve’s erection was hard against the small of her back. It would be so easy to lift her leg and just slip into her tight sheath, but she was still wearing the Santa boxers, so it would take more maneuvering than that.  He was about to pull those boxers down when he came to his senses; her just recovered body was trying to get some sleep.  He allowed himself one more hard grind into her, which made her cry out huskily.  Then he kissed the back of her head.

“You sleep, baby.  You need your sleep.”

“I need you.”

“You need sleep.  But you know what?”

“What?” she asked lazily.

“We made love here.  In this bed.”  Kayla smiled.  “You know what that means?  That means that when we wake up in the morning … you’re mine.”

Kayla was drifting back off to sleep with arousal in her belly.   “Ok,” she said.  “I wish it were morning.”  In seconds she was back asleep.

Steve felt her relax back into the measured breaths of sleep and released his hand from her breast.  He gently rolled away and sat on the edge of the bed.  Grabbing his cock in his hand, he was tempted to relieve himself of how incredibly horny he was.  It wouldn’t be a fraction as good as impaling her with it until they both screamed in orgasmic passion, but it would help.  Instead, he tucked himself back into his sweatpants and exhaled heavily.  Steve sat there in silence for a few moments waiting for the arousal to pass. 

The silence was broken by the rumbling of his stomach.

Damn, that’ll wake the dead, he thought, sure the sound of the hunger he didn’t even know he had would cause Kayla to stir again.  But, apparently, she was lost in her own slumber.  He hoped it was as happy as his was. 

So, with the contented glow his vision had given him, Steve headed for the kitchen for a midnight snack.  He looked at the clock; it said 1:42 A.M.  “Day eight,” he mumbled to himself.  “I can’t believe we’re on day eight.  Maybe we’re never leaving.”  Unbeknownst to him, the fear of separating within the same house had waned significantly for Steve.  Which is why he didn’t notice the fact that he walked right out of the bedroom door without even glancing back at Kayla.  They’d been there so long that the danger and paranoia were no longer the driving factors in their mundane decisions, like showering, going to the bathroom, or fixing a sandwich.

The first thing Steve saw when he opened the fridge was the jar of Ragu pasta sauce sitting on the relatively empty shelf.  His intention was to make a turkey sandwich, but upon eyeing the jar of sauce, he had a sudden urge to have some spaghetti.  That urge had less to do with his growling stomach and more to do with another kind of hunger altogether, but that escaped his conscious mind, too.  Before he knew it he had a big plate of just-drained pasta steaming up at him as he poured sauce hot out of the microwave over the top.  It was the same plate, he realized, as the one his last plate of pasta here had been served on.  The memory flooded back to him, Kayla looking very self-satisfied and horny sitting on the bed with plates of spaghetti she’d made while he was in the shower.  He chuckled thinking about it.  Steve’s penis had never quite returned to its natural state in the whole time since Kayla had fallen back to sleep in there, and the memory the smell of the spaghetti was evoking in him was not helping in the least.  He adjusted his cock as it grew at bit more, felt the undeniable hunger for the actual food, and sat down at the kitchen table to eat.

Kayla woke up in a dark, empty bed.  Knowing Steve wasn’t there caused her to become alert immediately as she sat bolt upright.  “Steve?” she called.  She turned her head toward the bathroom to see it was as dark and empty as the bed and started to worry.  Oh God, where are you?  Kayla got out of bed and went to check the rest of the small house.  When she saw the light on in the kitchen, she felt a measure of relief, but it wasn’t until she found him there live and in person that the panic truly dissipated. 

“Steve,” she said with surprise and relief, “I woke up and you weren’t there.”

“Hey Sweetness,” he beamed, so happy to see her in this moment.  “I’m sorry I scared you, baby, I didn’t wanna wake you, you were sleeping so nice, like a little kitty.”  Kayla folded her arms in front of her and cast a forgiving glance on him.  “Aw, don’t be like that, Sweetness, you’re right on time.”

“On time for what?” she asked.

“Can’t you tell?  I’m having a snack.”

“I can see that,” Kayla laughed.  “And smell it, too.  At midnight.”

“More like 2am, baby.”

“Even crazier,” she said cocking her head at him with amusement.  “Why are you cooking spaghetti at 2am?”

“I was hungry,” he said in mock defense.  “Look familiar?” he asked with a Cheshire Cat grin on his face and playful leer in his eye.

Kayla stopped short and realized what he meant.  “Ooooh,” she said with a flirty grin of her own.  “I see,” she said.  She sat down in the chair across the table and fixed sultry eyes on him.  “This is some midnight snack you’ve got goin’ here, Mr. Johnson.  Just what inspired you to this fine meal at this weird hour?”

“Actually, you did.”

“I did.  Really.”

“Baby, if I stayed in that bed one minute longer I was going to be having my way with you.”

“So you got up and made spaghetti instead?!”

“I told you I’d be having that in the morning, Sweetness.  I just wanted you to get your sleep.” 

Kayla smiled as she watched him shove a forkful of the pasta in his mouth.  He looked up at her as he chewed and saw the same love in her eyes as the Kayla in his dream.  He wanted to share it with her.

“Kayla, you make me so happy.  Did you know that?  I love you so much.”

Kayla felt the happiness along with the sincerity of his words.  “Steve,” she sighed. 

“I saw our babies, Kayla.  The ones you dreamed about, I dreamed about them tonight, too.  Our daughter.  And our unborn child.  They were beautiful. You were beautiful.  You told me once that having children was so that you could share all the love that was in your heart.  I shared it with them, and with you.”

Kayla’s eyes started to mist.  

“I have enough love for them.  Whoever they are.  And it made me so happy.  Here with you, whenever we are, I have so much love … I don’t know what to do with it, I feel it so much.  Do you understand?”

Kayla nodded.  She did understand that love.  And she felt a momentary pang of jealousy that his dreams left him happy while hers left her in misery.  It was only when she opened her eyes that she could find happiness in his arms. 

Steve saw it in the look deep in her eyes and said, “I have enough happiness to wipe those bad dreams away.”  He knew her so well.  “I’m giving it to you, baby.  Do you feel it?”

Kayla took a deep breath and smiled.  She did feel it, and she didn’t know a single woman on this earth that was as lucky as she was to have this man sitting before her, eating spaghetti, in a stranger’s house, at 2am.

he moment was getting heavy, and he felt his penis down below starting to react negatively to the heaviness, so he lightened the mood.  “Sweetness, this is a pretty big plate of spaghetti.  I think your tummy is hungry, too.  Wanna share?”

Kayla giggled.  “Well, I dunno, the last time we shared spaghetti here the things you’d been shoving in my mouth were far too big for me to eat.  Including the spaghetti.”

The words sent Steve’s cock into full attention.

“Oh yeah?” he said.  Well, if you think things are going to be different this time around you’re sadly mistaken.”  Steve then twirled a ridiculous amount of spaghetti around his fork and said, “open wide, baby.” 

“Oh, I think I’ve heard that before,” she said, her voice was dripping with sexuality.  She did as he commanded and took in the bite of spaghetti every bit as big as the last one had been 22 years ago. 

This time, instead of looking at him like “oh, real funny,” she closed her mouth around the pasta and closed her eyes in ecstasy.  Little moans escaped her as she enjoyed the food and slowly swallowed.   “Mm.  Good,” she moaned.

“Want another?”

“Mm-hm,” she cooed at him.

Steve twirled more spaghetti around the fork and fed it to Kayla.  She chewed seductively and swallowed it down, licking her lips of the sauce.  The head on his dick drove every thought going though the head on his shoulders. 

Kayla then took the fork from him and took a turn to feed him.  “You’ve got sauce on your mouth there.”  Steve licked it off, and Kayla pouted, “oh, I was gonna do that for you.”  He was quickly losing control.

“You haven’t finished your dinner, Kayla.  You’re a bad girl.  You’d better have another bite before you get a spanking,” as he shoved what would be her last bite in her mouth.

“What if I want a spanking?” she asked after she swallowed it down.  She sat back in her chair with a self-satisfied grin as she saw his reaction.  “Well,” she said innocently as she placed her foot on his chair across from her so that her toes fondled his balls, “that wasn’t really different from last time, you’re right.”  She wiggled her toes, and he released a gasp as his erection raged beneath his sweats.  “But some things better be different,” she said in a husky voice. 

“Like what, you little devil?”

“Like this time how about no one barging through the door just as you’re about to fuck my brains out.”

Steve was on her before she could take her next breath.  In one movement he tossed the plate of spaghetti into the sink not two feet away and then leapt over the table where she met him halfway in frantic arousal of her own.  He kissed her desperately, with carnal abandon, his tongue filling her mouth and exciting him even more as it explored.  Kayla nipped at his mouth, having all but lost control.  Steve’s left arm clutched her to him as his right hand kneaded her breasts.  He wasn’t gentle as he squeezed her nipples ‘til she screamed out.  The sensations running through her caused a release of wet between her legs.

“Do you know how badly I want you, baby?” he grunted as he unbuttoned her shirt.  Do you know how badly I want to be inside you?”  He then tore the open shirt off her body exposing the perfect, round breasts he’d been assailing.  He wasted no time and sucked one into his mouth, running his hot tongue around it until her nipple peaked into a hard pearl.  Feeling her nipples firm up in his mouth sent him into a frenzy.  He released it with a hard suck that sent a thrill through her body and flicked the other breast’s nipple back and forth with his tongue.  “It’s been so long, Kayla.  I want – I want to …”

“You want to what, Steve?” Kayla panted.  “What do you want?”

Steve shifted to lay her down on the table as he tugged her boxers down.  “You know what I want,” he huffed as he parted her wet folds with his finger as ground his hard cock into her thigh.  He wanted to impale her, but he’d come immediately, and he wanted this to last.

Kayla moaned as he teased her clit with his thumb.  “Tell me,” she demanded with a buck of her crotch against his thumb.  “Tell me what you want to do to me!”

“You want to hear it?”  He inserted two fingers inside of her as he searched for the spot that would bring her the kind of pleasure only he would witness.  “You want me to tell you how badly I want to fuck you?”

Kayla moaned his name.  “Yes, please, Steve, tell me again!  Tell me!”

“I want to fuck you, Kayla.  I want to impale you with my cock and fuck you ‘til you come, and then you know what I want to do?  I want to drink in all you have to give.  Lick and suck in your sweetness until you scream for me to stop.  But I’m not going to stop, because then I want to fuck you again,” he said roughly as he shoved his fingers into her more forcefully, “harder, and come with you, fill you up with my cum until I collapse on top of you.”  Kayla was whimpering his name, begging him to do exactly what he’d just said he wanted to do.  “Do you hear me, Kayla?”

“Yes!” she screamed.

“Do you hear what I want to do to you, baby?

“Yes, Steve!  Please!”

As his left hand assailed her below, he lifted her head with his right hand and locked onto her eyes.  “Then, baby,” he said with a gentler tone, “I want you to hold me tight as you come apart.  I want to feel your body as I hold you against me, tell me how much you love me, and feel me hold and kiss you.   He bit at her neck, then ran tongue-filled kisses over the nips.  Kayla was crying now, the intensity of it almost too much.  “That’s what I want, Sweetness.”  Then he kissed her lips with a sensuality that made her start to peak.  “That’s what I want to do to you.” 

“I love you, Steve,” she moaned as he continued to work her clit, “I love you so much!”

Steve moved to the spot between her neck and her shoulder that he knew drove her wild.  He stopped his ministrations below and started sucking that spot on her neck.  With every intention of moving downward, he found that he didn’t want to move away just yet.  He sucked some more, licking with his tongue and sucking with his lips, causing his wife to buck her hips against him as he now covered her with his body.  He knew he was marking her, and that’s what he wanted.  He wanted to see it on her neck, marking her as his, evidence of this moment, this night, this entire jump.  Kayla knew it, too.  She didn’t stop him.  He wanted him to mark her.  It excited her more. 

Finally, Steve released her neck and saw the red blotch already starting to bruise and felt a masculine satisfaction that made his dick swell more.  He trailed his kisses down between her delicious breasts, past her belly, down the inside of her thighs, then found his prize. 

“Eat me, Steve,” Kayla demanded.  “Please.”  She was lost in a sea of drunk arousal that screamed for orgasmic release.

“God, Kayla, you don’t know how hot you are.  You’re gonna kill me, Sweetness.”  Steve sat in the chair, threw his wife’s legs over his shoulders, and buried his face in her crotch.  She was so wet, and she tasted so good.  He licked and sucked and tasted and flicked his tongue over and over her clitoris while the need to be inside her increased with every whimper that escaped her lips.  He wrapped his arms around her thighs and spread her wider so that he could fully access her.  He shot his tongue I and out of her quickly and said, “soon it’ll be my cock, baby,” between licks.  “Soon my cock will be filling you up.”  Finally, he felt her start to climax.  He was running the roughness of his tongue over her swollen bud and could feel that she was almost there when finally she exploded against his mouth. 

“Steve!  Oooh … Yes!  Oooh, Steeeeve,” she cried.

Her orgasm was powerful, and she trembled with the waves that coursed through her as a long stream of wetness released, which Steve lapped up.  Kayla’s clitoris was over-stimulated now, and he was careful not to lick too hard, but he wanted her.  He wanted to keep tasting her until she was spent, and then he wanted to be inside her.

Steve picked up his wife, and she snuggled against his chest, breathing in his manly smell as he carried her back into the bedroom and laid her down on the bed.   She kissed him deeply and tasted herself all over his face. 

“Steve.”  She caressed his face as he looked into her eyes with longing and all the love that she knew really was overflowing his heart.  “You saved my life.  Thank you, baby.”  She looked deeply into his eye as she kissed him gently. 

“There’s nothing I wouldn’t do for you, Sweetness.  Or our family.”  Steve laid with his wife, his body covering hers, his penis laying just to the side of her core and throbbing to be inside of her.  

She wrapped her arms around him and laced her hand through his hair.  “Make love to me.  Please make love to—“

Steve’s heart sank as they both felt something neither of them had felt in eight days.  It was just a whisper, like the butterfly feeling a woman gets the first time she feels her baby move inside of her. 

“Oh no … Steve – dammit!”

“Shit!”  Steve yelled.”

“I don’t wanna go yet!  Kayla yelled while gripping her husband’s face in her hands.  I’m not ready to go!”

“Sweetness, listen to me, no matter what happens, I’m going to find you.”

“Promise me!”

“I promise you I’m gonna find you, baby, you hear me?!”

“We’ll find each other!”

The pull in their abdomens suddenly got very strong, signaling that the jump was almost there.

“My apartment!  Kayla, my apartment is home base. If we jump apart, we meet there.”

“Ok,” Kayla started to cry.  “Don’t leave me!  Don’t leave!”

“Don’t cry, Sweetness,” he soothed.  Then seconds before they left this most beautiful end to the worst jump they’d taken thus far where she almost died of atropine poisoning and he almost died of loneliness, Steve slid his penis hard inside of his wife making her gasp with gratified love, awe, and a strange sense of safety in their joining.  She immediately wrapped her legs around him and held him tightly as he clutched her just as fiercely.

“The minute we get wherever we’re going, we’re picking up where we just left off.” 

Then the jump took them.

Chapter Text

Find Me
Chapter 32

Reeling from the sudden departure from her warmth, Steve arrived in a dark, cramped space.  As his eyes adjusted to the darkness, his hand instinctively reached for his aching flesh … only to realize he was no longer hard.

His mind fumbled with the remnant pieces of the last jump while his eyes searched from some clue about his current situation.  He’d waited to jump for so long while they suffered through Kayla’s poisoning that when the jump finally came right during the throes of their passion it was a shock.  Like being ripped away from heaven. The complete change in his body chemistry at that moment added to the disorientation of the jump effect as he slowly gathered his wits.  Kayla, where you are baby, he thought.

He turned in search of her, only to be met with a wall of hanging … what is that … clothes?  He saw that light spilling in from the corner, and he moved slowly toward that. Peering out, his hand quickly found the doorknob in front of him. The room beyond was dimly lit and he could tell from the window across the room that it was nearly dark outside.  

Where the hell am I now? he thought as he scanned the vaguely familiar room through the small opening. Baby, where are you?

“Steve!” Kayla called out as if she heard his thoughts, her voice laced with both the residual effects of her desire and the now familiar fear that plagued the first few minutes of each new jump.  The body Kayla arrived into was strong, healthy, and completely devoid of her husband filling her with his steely erection.  One moment she was joined with him and the next she wasn’t.  Where am I?  She looked up to see her very young visage staring back at her through a bathroom mirror.  Ths mirror was familiar, as was the shower curtain that shown in its reflection.  Then it hit her.  Cleveland. I’m in my apartment!

Hearing her voice, Steve burst through the closet door and ran to her just as she ran out into the living room.

“Baby, I’m here,” he said as he took her in his arms. She buried her face in his chest and melted against his body. “Oh, baby,” he said as he comfortingly rubbed her back, allowing the soft silky texture of the fabric to slowly calm him.

As their heartbeats returned to normal, she pulled him tighter and deeply inhaled the masculine scent that was uniquely his.  She lifted her head and snuggled into the crook of his neck, nuzzling him as she pressed her breasts tightly against his chest. 

“Sweetness, are you okay?” he asked.

“Yes,” she huskily replied, her voice nothing more than a whisper.  He pushed back so he could see her face.  It was, literally, the first time he’d ever seen her.  She looked back up at him with darkened eyes and Steve was taken aback. She was so young, her complexion more tanned than the version of her he’d last left, and it made the blue of her eyes look even more endless.  He ran his hands down her arms not believing how soft and wonderful she felt. Her small breasts were barely covered by the low-cut slip, and his eyes soon landed on her hardened nipples, visible through the thin material. 

Kayla watched him watch her and all thoughts and fears about the jump and where they were and how long they’d be there were gone. In this moment, all she wanted was him inside her.

Steve watched Kayla’s chest rise and fall as his eye rose to meet hers, which were filled with the same desire he’d seen just minutes ago in 1987.  1987 ... we’re not there anymore.  Despite the fact that his thoughts were clouded by a desire that had managed to jump with him, questions about the here and now were clawing their way to the front of his mind.  He stared at her beautiful face, and as his mind registered where they were, an overwhelming sense of guilt and disgust filled him.

He tried to pull away, but Kayla stepped forward and wrapped her arms tightly around his waist. 

“Don’t,” he said as he looked away, ashamed by both the actions that had brought them to this place and his inability to control his body’s reaction to feeling her this close.  

“Steve,” she pleaded as she tilted her head, refusing to let him avoid her gaze.  

“No Kayla.  Don’t you see where we are?”

Without taking her eyes from his face, she allowed her hands to drift slowly from his waist and come to a rest on his tight bottom.  She rubbed him there before pulling his hips into her.  “I don’t care where we are.  I only care about where you just were,” she replied with a sultry hunger.

“Kayla, be serious, baby.  Look around us.  We’re in Cleveland.  And I was just watching you from that closet,” he replied, his self-loathing evident.  “Don’t you ... doesn’t this whole situation creep you out ... don’t I scare you?”

“Steve, look at me,” she said firmly. When he did not respond, she reached up and pulled his chin down. Her eyes met his one, and she smiled her beautiful, rosy lips at him.  “Do I look scared to you?”

He stared into her eyes, seeing only the love and desire she felt for him.  “Well, maybe you should be,” he replied less confidently than he’d intended.

She chuckled.  “I hate to break it to you, but you never scared me ... not really.  And you know what, I’m not going to have this conversation with you.  You’re my husband.  I know you ... and I want you.  Now,” she said as she leaned up to kiss him.

“But,”

“No,” she said as she pressed her fingers to his lips.  She was loving, she was tender, and she was insistent.  “I can’t wait any more.  We’ve been trying to make love for God knows how long.  Now I’m finally well again, and just as I feel you inside me for the first time in what feels like forever, we jump,” she continued as she began to slowly rock against him.  “Who knows how long we’ll be here ... I don’t want to go another minute without …” she reached for his hand, which hung limply by his side, and pulled it to her center, “... feeling you here.”

Steve closed his eyes as he lost himself in his desire for her.  “God, Kayla.  Baby, do you know what you do to me?” he said as he began to slowly rub her.  “I want you so bad,” he whispered before he crushed her mouth with his.

Kayla thrilled at the feel of his lips on hers ... on these lips for the first time.  So new yet so familiar.  Her body screamed for him as Steve’s words and actions in Gabrielle’s kitchen were still fresh in her mind.  “Oh Steve, please, baby ... please fuck me,” she moaned as he trailed kisses down her neck to the spot that always set her off.

He groaned at her plea and then finding the hem of her slip, lifted it up and off her body.  Now standing in just her panties, Kayla once again watched his face as his eye slowly scanned her nearly naked form.  “Baby,” he whispered as his hand tentatively reached out for her breast, “you’re beautiful.”

“And you, Mr. Johnson, are over-dressed,” she smiled as she put her hands on her naked hips.  “Clothes.  Off.  Now,” she demanded.

He laughed at her spunk and quickly complied with her order. In record time he was standing naked in front of her.  “Now look who’s over-dressed,” he said.

Hers eyes roamed leisurely over every inch of him as she stood transfixed by his magnificent form.  “Steve—I—you’re amazing,” she stuttered before stepping forward to trace the outline of the ink that marked his chest.  He stepped toward her, and as her lips found his dagger, his fingers danced down the thin fabric of her panties. Finding her warm and wet center, he once again began rubbing her there.  

Kayla’s head lolled as she fought to keep upright on her unsteady legs. “Please,” she pleaded.  Hearing her desperation and feeling the growing ache of his own desire, Steve dropped to his knees. Then, as he slowly peeled the panties down her legs, he watched her face as she smiled down at him. 

Stepping free from the last barrier that stood between them, Kayla licked her lips in anticipation.  With that, the last of Steve’s control was lost. 

He stood quickly and lifted her from the ground.  She wrapped her legs tightly around his waist and wove her fingers through his hair.  He stumbled forward and moved them toward the wall, where he pressed his body against hers.  Pulling his head up, Kayla, once again, found his lips. There, her tongue pushed forward and swept through his mouth. Delighting in the taste of him, she moaned and began to rock against him.  

Feeling Steve reach down to position himself at her entrance, Kayla halted her movements and leaned in to lace her tongue around his ear before giving her final command.  “Steve,” she whispered teasingly. “You just said what you wanted to do to me.  Do not be gentle.”

Steve surged upward and impaled in her one quick thrust.  She gasped at the sudden intrusion, and they both stilled as they took a moment to savor their long overdue union.  A moment passed, and as she sighed in satisfaction at the way he filled her, he began his rhythmic rock.

For several long moments they didn’t speak; they just gripped each other tightly and felt the depth of their connection with the sexual joining.  And it was profound. 

Kayla felt enraptured with her husband’s penis inside her.  And the coital pleasure was very intense very quickly.  “Oh yes … Steve.  That’s it ... just like that,” she moaned.

Steve was so happy to be pleasuring his wife as her own slick tightness gave the same to him.  “You like that baby? Is this what you’ve been missing?” he replied as his lips returned to the treasured spot on her neck.

“Mmmm hmmm,” she groaned as she rolled her hips and pushed forward to meet his thrusts.  “Faster, Steve ... faster,” she begged as her fingers dug into his back. 

“Hold on tight, baby,” he demanded as he gripped her smooth cheeks and began to pump harder.  Faster and faster he thrust into her, the only sounds being that of their heavy breathing and the pounding of their bodies against the wall.  

“Oh god!” she gasped as he continued to drive into her.  “Steve!  Don’t stop ... don’t stop.” Her body began to twitch as she felt the first burst of climax.  Then, just before an orgasm unlike any she’d ever experienced swept through her, her body went stiff.  Steve bit his lip and struggled to hold on as her womb pulsated around him repeatedly.  Out of breath and now beaded with sweat, Steve slowed his movements to a stop and held onto her now limp body. After a few moments, he adjusted his stance and began to move slowly again.

“Wait, wait,” she said as she pushed against his chest. 

“Are you okay, baby? Did I hurt you,” he managed between deep breaths.

Her eyes still heavy with satisfaction, Kayla smiled and leaned in to kiss the furrow of his brow.  “Oh yeah, I’m more than okay.”  She moved her body to be put down, and Steve complied, slowly pulling out of her and lowering her feet to the floor.  “I loved that,” she cooed as she raised up on tip toe and kissed his neck.  “But your arms might need a little break,” she said.  Then she backed away toward the couch.

He smiled and watched as her naked frame swayed with a sexual confidence that astounded him.  She looked upon him with heavily-lidded, satiated eyes and used her finger to summon him to follow.  And he was surprised when Kayla gripped the back of the couch with both hands, and then with a cock of her brow, she bent over. Recognizing her intention, Steve smiled and moved quickly to assume his position behind her.

“Oh, Sweetness ... you know how much I love this,” he said as her gripped her hips and once again positioned himself at her entrance.  He didn’t enter her right away, though.  Instead, he raised one hand and ran a feather-light finger down her back.  She shivered at the sensation then turned her head to look back at him.  

In awe of the beauty before him, he pressed his body fully against hers and then leaned down to meet her for a quick, tongue-filled kiss. She moaned and pushed back against him. Responding to her silent plea, Steve stood up and ran his two strong hands up and down her ribcage, stopped to knead both of her breasts, then followed the contours of her belly to rest on the curves of her hips.  There, he lovingly held her in place as he looked down to watch as his cock fill her once again. His eyes rolled at the intensity of the sight and a deep, throaty moan escaped him as he began to move.  Slowly at first so he could savor the moment, then faster.

“Do you like me like this, Steve?” she asked, fully aware he was no longer capable of speech.  As she expected, he responded by thrusting into her harder and faster.  The erotic sound of their bodies slapping together spurred her on, and she continued.  “You like taking me from behind, don’t you?”  Kayla’s voice was pure sex, and she wanted nothing more than to stay here feeling him covet her like this for the rest of her life.

His movements now in a near-frenzied state, Steve could only manage to grunt as the swell of his release began to take hold. Realizing this would be over all too soon if he didn’t do something, Steve grasped his last ounce of control to once again slow his movements to a stop.  He then leaned in to place wet kisses down Kayla’s back before pulling himself from her warmth.

Without a word, he lifted her up to a standing position, then grabbed her hand and pulled her to the front of the couch.  He sat down, leaned against the pillows, and positioned her in front of him.  “Now, baby, I want you to ride me,” he said as he pulled her to sit on his lap.  

Still in the daze of lovemaking, Kayla placed a knee on either side of Steve’s lap and then slowly lowered herself onto his cock. “Baby, you’re so tight ... I love to feel you so tight around me,” he said as she settled onto his lap.  “And I love to watch you fuck me.” 

Kayla lifted up and then slowly lowered herself again, her eyes never leaving his face.  She never got tired of looking at her husband’s beautiful face.  Her hardened nipples taunted him as she rose and fell, and his tongue soon came out in hopes of capturing one on its descent. Frustrated, he roughly grabbed her left breast and guided it to his mouth.  He licked and kissed it completely before pulling the nipple into his mouth.  

“I love it when you suck me,” she said as she began to move quicker.  His mouth now fully occupied, his hands found her hips, where he proceeded to help her as she moved against him.  

“You taste so good, Sweetness, let me taste your lips, baby,” he begged as he leaned up to her face. She leaned over him and let her hair fall across his face as their lips met.  They sucked and nipped and devoured before settling into a rhythm that matched their ride.  

Once again the swell or their orgasms began to take hold and he pulled back from the kiss as her hips moved faster and faster. “I want to watch you, Sweetness. I want to watch you as you come ... watch you as I fill you with my cum.” 

She sighed at his words. “Oh, oh ... oh god ... Steve, I’m so close. I love you!  Come with me baby, come with me,” she begged.

“I will ... I will ... I’m right here with you.  I’m fucking you like I said I would.  I’m fucking you so hard and when you come I’m going to come with you.  I’m going to fill you up, Kayla.”

“Steve!  I’m coming!” she screamed as her orgasm slammed into her.  Steve was nearly overcome as he felt the waves pour over her.  He thrust one, two, three more times before he released his torrent inside her.  

Spent, she fell against him as her body shook from the intensity of her climax.  He could feel her heart pounding through her chest and the contented smile on her face as it pressed into his neck.  In that moment, he couldn’t remember a time when he felt more gratified or happy or in love with this woman.  

He rubbed slow circles on her back and felt her breathing slow.  “I love you, Sweetness,” he said as he leaned over and pulled her with him until they were lying facing each other on the couch.  

“I love you too,” she said as she snuggled into his chest.  He held her for a long time, their legs intertwined and their bodies pressed together so tight it was hard to tell where one body stopped and the other started.  Soon he noticed the change in her breathing and he knew she was asleep. He smiled again and sighed as he too began to drift off.  

An hour later, Steve woke up with a start.  As his eyes snapped open the first thing he felt was Kayla dozing securely on top of him.  Sensing his restlessness, Kayla opened her eyes and smiled in contentment at her husband holding her.  She nuzzled against him searching for warmth.

“Hey baby,” Steve whispered to her.

“Hey yourself,” she sighed back.

“You’re cold, aren’t you?”  He scanned the immediate area but didn’t see a blanket. 

“Just keep holding me.  You feel so good.”

Steve held her tightly, enveloping her naked body against his.  He couldn’t help but notice that she didn’t feel quite the same.  She was her, but a version of her he’d never touched like this.  Unease gnawed at him.

Kayla felt him stiffen slightly.  She lifted her head so that her chin rested on her hand and looked at him.  “Is there something wrong?”

Steve kissed her.  “I love you so much, Sweetness.”  She smiled and placed a kiss on his chest.  But when she looked up, she could see worry behind his eye.  “I’ve been waiting to make love to you for so long,” he said with tender gratitude.  “It was amazing … making love to … to this—this version of you.  It’s like you gave me a new part of yourself that you’ve never been able to give me before.  It was so beautiful, baby.”

“You make me feel beautiful.”

“But Kayla …”  He sighed, not wanting to say this or feel it.  “Is this right?  We didn’t sleep together here.  It was more than a year from now that we finally made love for the first time.  Now this is kind of the first time.  Aren’t … aren’t you worried?”

Still basking in the afterglow, she hadn't yet had time to process what had happened between them.  But now her mind reeled with worry.  She'd been worrying about doing the wrong thing or forgetting to do the right thing ever since these jumps began.  Making love somewhere they hadn’t done so the first time around just felt like a mistake to her. Somewhere deep inside her, she felt that it was something they shouldn’t do.  But she couldn’t help herself this time, she was so desperate to be joined with him that her fears and worries were completely pushed aside by the love and longing that her soul demanded.

“Are you sorry we made love?” she asked softly.  “Do you think … did I …”

“No, baby, I’m not sorry,” he said quickly, shaking his head, needing to allay the fears he heard in her voice.  “You were worth the wait, Sweetness.  I couldn’t help it, I just had to have you.  And look, we’re still here, so I think we’re ok?”

Kayla let out a breath in relief and giggled.  They shifted their positions a bit so she was spooned against him in their favorite position.  “Ya know, this couch pulled out.  Maybe we should get into bed?”

A wave of guilt swept through Steve as he remembered watching her and singing her Rock-a-Bye Baby while she slept.  And for this moment, he hated who this man was that he’d jumped into.

Kayla felt something very wrong in Steve as he laid his forehead between her shoulder blades and sighed heavily.

“What is it?  Are you sorry we did this?”  A flush started to creep up her body.

“No!  No, I’m not sorry,” he repeated.  “Not about that.  I just.  I hate this guy laying here with you.  I hate who he used to be.”

“Steve—“

“I hate how I stalked you.  How I watched you undress from that closet I arrived in.  I don’t want to get in that bed, Kayla.  I watched you sleep in that bed.  I stood right over there,” he seethed as he tossed his head to his right.

“Steve!  You’re not that man.  You never really were.  Not even then.”

“Oh yes I was.”

“Well, I don’t care who you were then, I care that you’re my husband now.”

Steve embraced Kayla and kissed the back of her neck.  “I don’t know what I did to deserve you, Kayla,” he said as he cupped her breast in his hand and gently squeezed.

Kayla let out a small moan and nestled her rear against his crotch.  “You’re not sorry we made love, then?  In these bodies?  You’re sure?”

“Not for a second, baby.  I’m really sure.”

Just then Kayla felt a pull in her belly ... and closed her eyes in frustration.  Couldn't we just enjoy this for a few more minutes. Is that too much to ask. "Aaand, here we go.  Well, at least we got to finish this time," she joked as she reached up to grasp his hand tightly to her chest.  

"What's that?" he replied as he nuzzled her neck.

Kayla froze.  "Steve, don't you feel that?"

"Feel what?" Steve replied half sitting up.  He was alarmed at her sudden change.

“The jump!  Don’t you feel the jump?” She replied as she too sat up, the panic now clear in her voice.  She looked at him and could see that he wasn’t feeling the tug.

"Steve?"

Steve felt the panic now.  Because there was no question in his mind that the jump effect hadn’t reached him yet.   He grabbed her by the shoulders just as the room blurred in her vision.  “Baby?!” he said.

"Steve!" she screamed as she slipped from the body still in his arms.

In the next moment, Kayla found herself in the Emergency Center with a burning pain stinging her side. Steve was sitting a foot away with his hands on her blouse looking at her with worry on his brow, and she knew in that instant where she was.  This was when an addict had come in to steal drugs and ended up taking a slice out of her.  Steve had tenderly taken care of her wound, and she remembered how nervous he was.  She looked down as his trembling hands reached for her buttons, and despite the pain, she smiled.

"Steve!  Oh, thank God.  I thought I was leaving you behind,” she said as she threw her arms around him and practically fell into his lap, the pain all but forgotten.

"What?" Steve nervously asked as he let go of her shirt and put his hands up like he he’d gotten caught stealing.  He was utterly confused.  He laughed a nervous kind of chuckle.  “You’re bleedin’ here, baby, you sure you didn’t get hit in the head, too?”

"No, no ... it's not that bad.  Really, I it doesn't seem to hurt as much as the first time," she replied.   She watched as he tentatively released the last few buttons.  "It’s okay, just take it off.”  When he did not, in fact, just take it off, Kayla started feeling the pain and sucked in a breath.  “It’s ok,” she said tightly, “it’s nothing you haven't seen before."

He stopped and looked up her, a strange and uncomfortable look on his face.  She watched him carefully, searching for some sign of recognition in his eye, but there was none there.  The knowing presence of their bond was not there.  Just silence.  And she knew then ... this was not her Steve.

Chapter Text

Find Me
Chapter 33

The soft whirring of the machinery was interrupted by a chirp he hadn’t heard before.  The foreign sound startled him, and his heart started racing with possibilities.  He went immediately to the master screen and discovered nothing obviously out of the ordinary with the slipstream.  At least not on first glance.  Then he noticed it.  It was small, almost imperceptible, but it was there.  Then it was gone.  He’d have to check the reports.  Admittedly, the numbers their journey was throwing were exceptional, far more than he’d expected.  But again, time was a factor that couldn’t be held to exactitudes, so he didn’t have any cause for concern. 

Until now. 

Because these numbers weren’t just exceptional, they weren’t normal.  These numbers were so out of the realm that they couldn’t be explained by the randomness of time.  All this because of that miniscule blip? he wondered.  Or maybe not so miniscule.  There was no way to know.  It was a marvel, really, this miracle of science.  The instability of it even more so.  He walked back to the master screen.  A part of him was bitter that he couldn’t be a fly on the wall and observe it all in the first person rather than as a series of numbers, charts, graphs, and phase-shifts.  He stared at the slipstream, noted their positions, and let his frustration show in the beadiness of his eyes. 

“Which one of you stepped on the butterfly, Mr. Johnson?” he said out loud.  “What have you done?”

Chapter Text

Find Me
Chapter 34

Kayla’s heart sank into the pit of her stomach.  The realization that this was not her Steve, that she really did jump alone, set upon her with a cold chill. 

This man was Steve, it was definitely Steve, the man she would love, marry, and have children with.  But it wasn’t the one that belonged to her in 2009 with all the knowledge of their shared lives within him.  This Steve stared at her with an eye she now looked away from with a shy reservation that she hadn’t felt in decades.  It was square one with this Steve, she didn’t know what to say or do, and she couldn’t begin to figure out where to go from here.

“I … I’m sorry.  I … you, ah …”  The heat of embarrassment rushed up her neck, and every hair stood on edge as she fought to grasp that she was here, but he was not.  What was she supposed to do, explain it to this Steve?  Considering that she could barely string two words together, that was not likely to happen.  Was she supposed to pretend that she was 20^th century Kayla?  She didn’t even know for sure who was President right now, her mind was swimming.  

The Steve of this time had his own stricken look on his face as he watched her stammer.  Kayla watched him cast that deep green eye upon her as she struggled to stay focused, and she registered a distinct confusion there.  She stole a glance at him and saw that he was looking down at her wound, the blood from which now having seeped through her camisole and into her shirt.

“Baby, you’re really bleedin’, here,” Steve said, the wariness gone in favor of a concern he just couldn’t hide.  “What do I do here, now, just tell me what to do!” he said just below a shout.

She detected his growing panic, but the sting was creeping back, and she tried to focus on it clinically so that she wouldn’t start crying.  “Clean … clean it.  We need to … uh … gauze … somewhere.”

Kayla looked in Steve’s eye and heard his voice, and it was like stepping through time.  A different kind of time than all their previous jumps, though.  All those times, their awarenesses were present in these bodies.  Steve had the character and inflection that made him the man she was married to in 2009 even if it was coming out of a younger body.  But this Steve wasn’t him.  This was a Steve still fighting against the ebb and flow of the feelings he’d developed for her all while succumbing to the fact that he couldn’t stay away from her.  This was a very early model Steve in body and in substance.  This was a Steve she hadn’t seen in a very long time.  It was like visiting a moment in her life captured on film.  The moment left her with a profound sense of melancholy. 

It was, however, just that one moment, because just then Kayla saw Steve start to look distinctly nauseous with a very strange look on his face.  She watched as his expression went blank and his grip on her shirt froze.  Alarmed, Kayla put a hand on his shoulder.  Then just as quickly he inhaled sharply, his eye focused, and his whole stance changed.

He jumped!   Somehow she just knew it to be true.  It’s him!  There was no question in Kayla’s mind that this was her Steve again.  That she’d just witnessed his arrival into … whatever year this was.  Her eyes went wide with the wonder of it as her lips parted.  Is that what we look like when we jump into ourselves? she wondered.

Her Steve had arrived, met with the usual dizziness, nausea, and apprehensiveness always present in those first seconds.  Of course this one came with a bit of a new wrinkle, as well.

“Kayla!” he yelled as his eye rolled with the disorientation.

It was only a moment of hesitation as the relief flooded through her with such force that she felt it down to her toes.  But when she didn’t answer him right away Steve instinctively grabbed her by the shirt tails the body he’d arrived in was holding.  This brought the pain that had been on the edge of her consciousness to the surface, making her cry out.  Steve immediately let go of her like he’d just picked up something hot, his eye going wide; but the confusion seemed to hang like a thick cloud this time.

“What?  What is it?  Where are we?” he gasped as he darted his head around. 

“Emergency Center!” Kayla gasped as she reached for his hand and brought it to her face. 

“Baby?” Steve said, still looking confused.  “You ok?” 

Kayla nodded as she remembered to breathe again.  “I’m here.  And you made it, too.”  She closed her eyes to the feel of his hand against her cheek.

“That’s when he spotted the blood on his hand.  And just like that the cloud evaporated.  “Kayla whose blood is this?” he asked with alarm.  Shit, I just got her well, are we gonna have to be at this again?!  He didn’t think he could take it. 

“It’s mine,” Kayla said as he wiped at the smudge that had transferred from her shirt to his hand and then to her cheek.  “We’re at the Emergency Center.  Do you remember?”

Not really.  “What – what year?  Are you hurt?  He gently put his hands on her as he tried to check her.

“198 … 6.  I think.  We’re not married yet.  There was a junkie with a knife.  It’s my side here.”  The words came rolling out of her in a manic run-on sentence.  Steve looked down and saw blood seeping through her shirt and remembered when Max had come at him in a mad rush to come help Kayla.  “It’s really nothing,” she continued, starting to get short of breath.  “It’s just a cut, I didn’t even need stitches, we just have to clean it, like last time,   you cleaned it up last time, there’s gauze and tape and it was ok, it’s not serious.”  The words came out in a staccato rush.

“Shh, baby, slow down,” Steve said as he looked at her with concern. 

She saw her husband there.  It was definitely him there, and it made her heart beat even faster. She was getting dizzy.  “Steve, it’s ok, really.  It just stings is all.  Looks worse than it really is,” she laughed without humor.  Her breaths were labored, and she broke out into a cold sweat.  She was having a panic attack, and she knew it.

And so did Steve.  “Kayla, look at me,” he very calmly demanded, and she did.  “Calm down.”  Kayla nodded and took a deep breath as he held her face firmly in his hands.  “I’m here now.  We’re both here.  Now you look in my eye and you calm down right now.”  She did as she was told, and Steve took a deep breath through his mouth, silently directing her to do the same, which she did as best she could.

Steve and Kayla sat there in a charged silence.  She tried to get a grip on herself, and he tried to calm her down with gentle strokes of her face.  They both knew something had gone terribly wrong with that last jump, but neither knew what to say.

Kayla was so tired of crying.  So, she took another deep breath and closed her eyes.  She felt his hands on her face and calmed a bit. 

“That’s it, Sweetness, I’ve got you.”  She opened her eyes.  “Let’s get you patched up, here, ok?”  Then he chuckled.  “Funny choice of words, huh, Sweetness?”  Steve got up and started looking for the supplies.  “I remember that junkie, now, baby.  Is he that guy I gave a real pounding to before he ran off?”

“That’s the one,” Kayla said softly and breathing easier.

Steve found antiseptic, gauze, and some tape in a medical bag on the table and gently unbuttoned Kayla’s shirt.  “I remember the first time I did this,” he said.  “I was afraid to touch you.”

Kayla had almost completely calmed down now.  “I remember,” she said.  “You were a gentleman.”

“Guess I got over that, didn’t I?” he said with the leer that Kayla loved.  When he was finished with her wound he took one of the gauze pads and gently removed the smudge of blood from her face.  “It’s not that big a cut, baby, but it sure did bleed a lot,” Steve said, finishing up the bandage and pulling her camisole back down.  He saw the look in her eyes and knew she wanted to talk about the jump.  But he didn’t know what to say because he was just as freaked out as she was. 

Steve kissed her gently and then put his forehead against hers.  “I was only a few seconds behind you, Sweetness.  I don’t know what happened, but I wasn’t far behind.”  His kept his voice deep and soothing.

“But we’ve never done that before.”  Kayla’s agitation was apparent.  “Are you sure you didn’t feel it coming when I did?”

Steve shook his head.  “No, I didn’t feel a thing till after you were–“ He looked away and adjusted his patch uncomfortably. “—gone, I guess.  You screamed my name, and then finally, the jump started for me, too.  You looked like you were kind of gone in there, and that’s the last thing I saw before I jumped.”

Kayla took his hand and held it to her heart, then he guided her by the back of her head to lay it on his shoulder.  They just held each other like that for a few moments, each silently wondering where to go from here.  Their silence was broken by an angry voice behind them.

“Get the hell off my sister, Johnson!”

Kayla pulled away quickly to see John and Abe with astonished looks on their faces. Actually, Abe looked somewhat amused, but John was positively irate. 

“Sis, what the hell are you doing?!”

Kayla was startled and completely unprepared for them to walk in.  “Joh—“

“Roman!” Steve interjected.  Look, Kayla, it’s Roman!  Came to pay your sister a visit?”

Kayla realized her mistake.  This was when they all thought he was Roman.  It was so hard to keep straight.  Her head was so messed up she didn’t know which way was up.”

“The, uh, suspect was caught down on the pier,” Abe said.  We came for your statements.”

Luckily, Kayla didn’t have a lot of time to process Abe and her on-again-off-again brother, because the tug in her belly hit her hard. 

“Not again!  Steve, it’s happening already, do you feel lit?” she asked, her heart kicking back up again.

“Feel what?” John spat.  “Sis, did he hurt you?!” Neither he nor Abe noticed that they were being ignored like extraneous extras.

Steve wasn’t feeling the jump yet, and she could see it in his eye.  “I’m right behind you, baby, I am!  You’ll see, I’ll be there, Sweetness!”  Steve kissed her quickly and held her tight. 

“What do you think you two are doing, get off of her!” John yelled.

It was the last thing Kayla heard as the jump took her. 

“I love you,” Steve whispered,” but his Kayla had leaped away before she could hear it.  Steve felt her suddenly tense up and knew she was gone.  I’ll be there, baby!  He prayed that was true, felt John roughly drag him out of Kayla’s frozen embrace, and breathed a sigh of relief as the tug started in his own belly. 

“Nice seein’ ya up and around again, man,” Steve said.

“Johnson, what the fu—,” John replied as the room fell away.

The minute she arrived, Kayla knew she was in the loft.  Steve was saying something to her, but she couldn’t make out what it was.  Within moments, he had grasped her by the shoulders and was holding her against him.  He felt good, but she didn’t smile.  Because she knew that she’d jumped without him again.  This time the emotion she was feeling most wasn’t fear or panic or even longing.  This time the emotion she was feeling before she’d even taken a breath in this body was anger.  She didn’t know why she jumped without him again, not to mention so quickly, but she was so very tired of this and fit to be tied.

“… hearing me?”

“Yeah …,” she said, breathing deeply, not quite able to keep the affect out of her voice.

Steve looked at her with a questioning eye.  “You sure, baby?  You looked like you were on another planet for a second there.”

Not my Steve.  Not that she thought it would be.  She’d hoped it was, but she could plainly tell that it wasn’t and was again met with the challenge of what to do next.

“Sorry,” she said a bit awkwardly.  “Ah … what were you saying?”  She tried very hard not to show how upset she was while she tried to focus on what to do.

He smiled cautiously.  “I said I was thinking maybe we could pick up where we left off the other night.”

“Right … the other night,” When was this?  She just didn’t know.  She couldn’t help softening, though.  He looked so handsome and so very male in his long hair and brown leather jacket with the oatmeal colored button down shirt she used to love peeking through; she could almost feel it.  And she knew that look on his face and what he was suggesting they “pick up.”  They were together here, but when? It was summer our first time … has to be before.

“That is, if you want to …”

She could tell her sudden behavior shift was throwing him, but Kayla never got a chance to figure out what to do about it, because right then he seemed to tense up and sway.  “Steve?” Then his eye focused, and he took in a lungful of air.  She knew he’d arrived, she could hear it in his breathing.  “Steve?”  She took his hands and waited for him to right himself.  “Steve!”

“Right here, Kayla,” he said as he immediately went to adjust his patch.  His tone of voice wasn’t quite what she was expecting.  Almost put upon.  Doubt nagged at her.  Did he arrive?  What if he didn’t?  She had to be sure.

“Steve, do you remember Stockholm?  The last time we were there, I mean? 

The Steve that was her husband had, indeed, arrived, and he understood what was happening.  Again.  She got here first.

“What is this, 20 Questions,” Steve said reaching for her, “I’m here, now, it’s me.”

Kayla let out the breath she was holding and walked into his arms.  She smelled the leather and his unmistakable scent and closed her eyes to the feel of him.  Then she popped her eyes open as a thought burst out.  “Wait, how do you know it’s me?”

Steve chuckled, but he wasn’t feeling any humor.  “I know you, Sweetness, that’s how I know.  Your little Stockholm question was also a dead giveaway, wasn’t that the point?”

“Right,” she said feeling a bit silly.  “I’m not thinking.”  He could hardly blame her, these last two jumps with no time to recover right after their awful time during her poisoning was taking its toll on them both.  “It happened again, Steve.  Why is this happening?”

“I dunno, baby, it was the same as last time. You checked out first, then I felt it just as Roman was hitting me with some choice words.”

“Roman.”  She looked up at Steve and felt her heart constrict at bit.  “He sure felt like Roman back then, didn’t he?”

“Baby, I still have a hard time lookin’ at that other guy.  That all happened while I was away, so I still think of John as your brother.”

“He always did give you a hard time back then, didn’t he?”

“Yeah, he got over it,” he smiled down at her.  And for the first time he really looked at her. She was beautiful.  The color of her sweater was the color of a warm summer sunset, and her hair smelled so good. 

“What are you looking at me like that for?”

Steve touched her face and ran his thumb across her bottom lip.  “So pretty.”

Kayla looked into his eye and was so happy he was there with her, she was afraid to let him go.  She slid her index finger down his patch.  “So handsome,” she smiled.

Then a voice spoke from behind them, startling them so much that they both jumped.  “Kayla, do you have a needle and thread? There seems to be a button loose on my –“

For just a moment, Steve forgot exactly where and when he was as he stared into the impossibly young and innocent face of his sister.

Chapter Text

Find Me
Chapter 35

Steve felt his pulse in his throat as Adrienne stood at the step to the guest room looking at them uncomfortably.  It wasn’t surreal, like with Marcus, it was more like with his mother.  To see his sister looking so young and innocent, it was a bittersweet gift.  This was before their father had raped her, he was sure of that.  He knew he had to keep his head and not go to her and hug her, though the thought of doing so did run though his mind.  But the discomfited way she stood and the fact that she was at the loft at all told him that he didn’t know who she was yet.  This was after Stockholm, right when she’d first come to town.

Neither he nor Kayla had said anything yet, and as far as Adrienne knew, Steve was just as disdainful of her now as this time’s Steve was.

“I’m sorry,” Adrienne said defensively.  “I didn’t know.”

Steve swallowed and tightened his grip on Kayla’s hand.  “Didn’t know?” he asked.  “Didn’t know what?”

Adrienne shifted her eyes and crossed her arms in front of her.  “That you were here.  I didn’t know you were coming over or I would have left.  Or stayed in my room or somethin’.”

“Oh.  Well, uh,” Steve scratched the back of his head stalling for something to say, because he was plum clueless about what he should say to her.  So, he opted for the simple.  “No, that’s ok. 

“It--?”  Adrienne got a hopeful look in her eyes.  “It is?  But I just interrupted you – again – and I know I’ve been a pest and all.”

“Adrienne, ah … you’re staying with me.”  She phrased her question as a statement, beginning to remember this timeframe a bit better.  Not great, but better.  She was nearly sure Jo hadn’t arrived in town yet, it was just Adrienne.

“She’s staying here?” Steve asked.

Adrienne tried not to sound defensive.  “It was just that my place got broken into, see.”

“Right, I let her stay with me for a while,” Kayla remembered.  “You, ah, weren’t real happy about it.  I think,” she kind of whispered in Steve’s direction.

Steve turned away from Adrienne and lowered his voice to Kayla.  “This is before—“

“Pretty sure,” Kayla clipped back just as softly.

Adrienne looked upon them whispering and felt completely in the way.  Nothing got more in the way of her mission to get her brother back in their lives than herself, and she just wanted to lash out.  Like right now, obviously they wanted to be alone, and she was making him hate her even more just by being there.  I just keep messing things up, she thought. 

“Give me ten minutes, I’ll clear out,” she said, unable to hide the disappointment from her voice as she headed back to the guest room.

“No!” they both said.  Adrienne stopped in her tracks and looked at Steve with adoration that he clearly saw now but that sailed over his suspicious head back then.  “I mean,” Kayla quickly finished, “that you don’t have to leave on our account.”

“No, I’m in the way.  I was in the way the other day, I’m cramping your style.  I really want to give you your space.”

“’Cause we were just about to head to Steve’s place—,” Kayla said quickly.

“We were?”

“Yep, sure were!” Kayla said enthusiastically.  Then she reached for Steve’s hand, held it up in front of them both, and squeezed it.

“Yeah, that’s right, baby, we were.” Then he turned to his sister and looked her right in the eyes.  “Yeah, we were just leavin’, Adrienne, so you’re not bothering us at all.”

Adrienne.  Her heart was bursting when her brother said her name without anger, snark, or suspicion for the first time since she’d shown up in Salem.  She was almost afraid she was going to wake up.  “Really?” she asked. 

She sounded like a little girl, and Steve wished with a tinge of regret that he’d known her growing up.  “Yeah, baby, you do whatever you want, Kayla and I —“

“—Are going now!”  Kayla took Steve’s hand and awkwardly told Adrienne goodbye before Steve could say anything else to her. 

“Kayla, Steve, wait!” Adrienne shouted to them as they pulled open the loft door.  Kayla turned to look at Adrienne very hesitantly, wanting nothing more than to get to Steve’s apartment so they could talk about this.  “Don’t you want your purse?”  Kayla looked around, having no clue where that might be. 

Adrienne was surprised that Kayla was looking at her with an almost lost expression on her face, so she pointed at the counter.  “Over there,” she said.  Kayla grabbed it and let out a nervous laugh, then let Steve lead her out the door.  “Kayla,” Adrienne laughed.  “Aren’t you going to put on your coat?  It’s freezing out there, isn’t it, Steve?”

Steve couldn’t help but feel annoyed to be delayed but also happy to hear his sister’s voice.  He ran his hand through his hair and kind of grinned at her, which made Adrienne completely self-conscious.

“My, ah … right.  Yes, I am, I guess I’m just so lost in thought I forgot!”  Kayla gave another nervous chuckle as she glanced around the room desperate to leave and finally spotted it on the coat rack right where it belonged.  She slipped on the long navy blue coat with white etched line pattern that she’d remembered so fondly.  What ever happened to this coat? she absently wondered.

Adrienne thought the two of them were acting a little weird but didn’t want to say anything to anger Steve now that he’d seemed to lose his smarm and snark and was being nice to her.  So, she just kept her mouth shut and smiled as she watched them stumble through leaving the loft. 

Once out the door they could not move to that elevator fast enough.  “You ok?” Kayla asked after Steve dragged the gate heavily across the elevator threshold. 

“Yeah,” Steve said with a bit of a sigh.  “I think I’m starting to get used to it.”

Kayla had been warily preparing to jump since practically the minute she arrived.  She felt like time was running out if they didn’t talk right away.  But she knew that seeing Adrienne had to be tugging at him; it was affecting her, too.  She brought his hand she was still holding up to her lips and kissed it then looked up at him.  “I’m sorry.  I hope it’s ok that we didn’t stay.”

Steve pulled her into an embrace and let the scent of her hair wash through him.  I don’t think we had a choice, Sweetness.  We’re doin’ the right thing, we can’t get distracted right now.  I don’t know what happened, but this can’t be good.”

Once in Steve’s car, they didn’t waste any time.  “That’s twice, Kayla.  Twice that you’ve jumped before me.”

“Yeah, but why?  Why am I jumping first now?”  Steve didn’t say anything, but Kayla watched as he worked his jaw in frustration.   He had a thought that clawed at him.  He didn’t want to think about it and pushed it away.  “Steve?”

“What?” he asked sharply.

Kayla heard the tone in his voice but was too on edge to tiptoe.  “Do you think it’s something we did?  Or didn’t do?” 

“I don’t know, Kayla!” Steve yelled harshly.  “What am I, Carnac, now, baby, I don’t know!”

Kayla startled at the way he’d just lashed out at her, then stiffened in her seat. 

“Why are you yelling at me?” she bristled.

Normally Steve regretted speaking harshly to her the minute he’d do it. This time, however, he was too freaked out to get quick hold of himself and continued.  “Because I don’t know what’s going on any more than you do!  You’re askin’ me like I’ve got all the answers, but I don’t know shit, here!  I can’t stop it, I don’t know what to do to get us back in sync, I don’t know how to make us stop jumping!  Hell, I just want to go home!  How do we get out of this goddamn loop, baby, I don’t know!  Now I can’t even hold on to you from one jump to the next, and all I really wanna do is just get home and be us, doin’ whatever we want and not have to worry if we’re fucking things up! THAT’S WHY, BABY!”

Kayla listened to Steve’s tirade with swelling anger of her own, but rather than sling it back at him, she turned away and thought hard about something he’d just said.  It made the gears turn in her head, and worry lurched her stomach into knots. 

They quickly arrived at the pier outside Steve’s apartment, but his mood hadn’t improved any.  Kayla got out of the Bluesmobile, shut the door hard, and walked over to his side of the car where he was still sitting in the driver’s seat with his fingers firmly gripping the steering wheel.  She stared down at him until he finally looked up at her with a slightly milder eye.  She stepped aside as he got out of the car.  The leather of his brown bomber jacket squeaked as he shoved his hands in his back pockets and shifted from one foot to the other.

“Feel better now?” Kayla asked with annoyance.

“No,” Steve exhaled deeply as he pulled his wife to his chest and held her tightly.  “I’m sorry, Sweetness, I’m an asshole.”

Kayla laid her head on his chest, the cold leather sending a chill through her, but feeling him holding her more than making up for the cold.  “No, you’re not; you’re upset.  I am, too.”

“Yeah, but I’m the only one yelling.  Why do you stay with me?”

She reached up, grabbed his chin, and gave it a little shake.  “So, is it out of your system, now?”

“I don’t know about that,” he admitted lifting his head a bit to silently encourage her to nuzzle in his neck, which she did.  “But I’m sorry I yelled at you.”  He continued to hold her tightly.

She lifted her lips toward his and kissed him.

“Well, here we are, again,” Kayla said once inside Steve’s apartment.  The sense of urgency to have this discussion had not diminished, because she didn’t know when it was going to happen, but she was cautiously waiting at every turn for the jump effect to begin.  So, she took off her coat, threw it on the chair, and started right in.

“Steve, we should think about where we’ve been and what we did just before we jumped there.  Maybe we’re doing something.”

Steve shook his head.  “Naw, baby, that’s not it, the jumps are just random.  We’re not doing it.”

“Shouldn’t we at least think about it?”  She paced the room and absently noticed the neon of the Shenanigans sign bathing the basement apartment in a steady rhythm of red.  “I mean, haven’t you noticed that things are getting harder about these jumps, not easier?”

Steve had noticed it. He’d noticed other things, too, that he didn’t want to admit to himself.  Things about Cleveland. He didn’t say anything, but Kayla caught the look in his eye.

“Our first few jumps weren’t just together, we were actually touching each other when we got there.  Then there was that jump on the pier.  We jumped to the same place, but we weren’t with each other.”

“Yeah,” he said, “but it’s not like we were separated like when we got to the compound.  That was the first time we were actually separated.”

“Wait, where were we just before that?”

Steve had to think hard, and it occurred to him how ludicrous the whole thing was that he was now not only remembering their lives in their original timeline, but now he was trying to recall this new one, too. 

“You were drunk.  That was the night you got drunk with Adrienne, we jumped away right when you were feeling sick.”

Did we make any changes?  The thought flitted through Kayla and a nagging worry continued to press on her as she struggled to remember what they may or may not have done.

“Ok, then you found me in the truck.”

“And we had our Frontierland adventure time with a gift shop and everything,” Steve smiled.  “So damn cute, baby.”

Kayla smiled back enjoying the moment.  Then her expression turned serious again.  “Then there was the poisoning, and we were separated when we arrived there, too.”

“But with Cleveland, we were together there.”

“Well …,” Kayla interjected,” I guess we were.  Kind of.”  Steve raised a questioning brow to her.  “Well, we were both in my apartment, but you were behind one door, I was behind another.  But … yes, you’re right, we weren’t separated there …”  Kayla trailed off as they both got lost in their own thoughts.  Her mind raced as she jumped from one thought to the next and soon got lost in the sea of leaps she tried to keep track of. 

Through this discussion and especially with the mention of Cleveland, Steve was getting more and more agitated as his true fears gnawed at his subconscious.  Though he didn’t voice them, they were the same fears Kayla was having as she tried to piece together a theory.  And it wasn’t a good one.

“Steve?” she began cautiously, “Steve, where are all the places we’ve been so far?”

“Too many places to remember.  A lot of places.”

“We need to write this down, I can’t keep it straight.  Do you have paper and a pencil?”

Steve looked at her with irony.  “I dunno, baby, I haven’t lived here in 20 years, you know as much as I do.”

Kayla rolled her eyes and tried to let his snark roll off her back.  “Well you’re the detective in the family, could ya maybe open a drawer?”

Steve rolled his eye and sighed, then went through a couple drawers before he found an unopened bill and a pen.  He handed them to her and kissed her forehead in apology.  They sat down on the bed facing each other and she ran her finger down his patch in acknowledgement.

Together they recalled all the places they’d been, beginning with the loft the day after Marlena (didn’t) die. 

“That was a lot of panic and looking for Joe.” Kayla felt a pang of sadness as Steve exhaled heavily.  “And I gave you the pool cue,” she added.

Steve perked up at that.  “Yeah,” he smiled.  “Then we went to the house.  I got to be with my girls,” he continued smiling. 

They continued through all the jumps:  The few moments in the hospital elevator, New Years Eve at the Deveraux estate, Stockholm, the pier on election night, the loft when she was drunk, undercover as Daniel Lucas, back at the Deverauxs when she was poisoned, then to Cleveland, the Emergency Center after the junkie, and now back to the loft again.  It took quite a while to get it all down, figure out what they were each doing right before the jump, and before they knew it an hour had gone by.

Kayla stayed seated cross-legged on the bed getting everything down in a truncated sort of shorthand on the limited real estate of the standard envelope.  Meanwhile, they were both hungry, and Steve happened to have a pretty stocked fridge.  He made them turkey sandwiches on soft, crusty rolls with lots of lettuce and tomatoes, and potato chips.  Steve opened a beer and looked forward to self-medicating his nerves.  Both of them ate every last bite, as was common for their meals since their leaps had begun; they never knew when their next opportunity to eat would be and/or if they’d jump in the middle of it.  The last real meal they’d had was the spaghetti at Gabrielle’s house.  We didn’t get to finish what we started until Cleveland, Steve thought becoming less and less able to ignore what kept bubbling up to the forefront of his mind. 

Eventually, Kayla had a solid list of their jumps, how long they lasted, and anything they did there.  They looked for patterns in the places they were, the time of day they jumped into, the length of their stay, the people that surrounded them.  Was it something they were saying? Something they were doing?  They each silently hoped to find some kind of pattern, something that would pop out at them when written down like this.  Anything to steer them away from what they both feared but weren’t saying. 

Steve watched Kayla study the list and chew on her bottom lip as she contemplated it.  He frowned.  He knew what it said.  He didn’t want to acknowledge it.  He tried to push it away, afraid to say it to Kayla.  Both of them were so lost in their own worry that they didn’t realize they’d both come to the same conclusion.

Kayla looked up to see Steve boring a hole into her with his green eye.  “I, ah, I think I found something,” she said with a disquiet in her voice.  Steve didn’t answer her but came to the bed and sat beside her.  “When we jumped to the pier, it was our sixth jump,” she said.  “It was the first time we arrived somewhere separated.”

“We weren’t though,” he said gently.  “It’s not like you were in one part of town and I was in another, it’s just that there were a ton of people around.  It’s the first time we jumped somewhere with other people.”

Kayla hadn’t considered that, and she felt a sliver of hope.  “Ok, that’s true, too.  So, it was the first jump with other people there.  But—but it was also the first one where we weren’t right next to each other when we arrived into our past bodies.”

Steve kept silent and let her continue.

“Just before that we were in Stockholm.  We—we—we were, well we were intimate.”

“I’m not listening to this, Kayla,” he turned away from her, not wanting to hear any theories that involved not being able to touch his wife.  “Yeah, we were intimate, and we were also eating, maybe it has something to do with food, huh?  Wasn’t I out getting you towels, maybe it’s because we separated when the jump started!”

“But then when we were at the loft, I was drunk, and we were really going at it there, too.”

“No, we didn’t do anything.  You fell asleep on me – just like last time,” he grinned but neither of them were feeling any amusement.  “And, yeah, I couldn’t help myself, I was crazy wanting you.  We both wanted it, not just then but the first time, too.  But we didn’t do anything more this time than we did last time! 

“Are you sure?  Because I don’t remember either time well.”  Steve bristled, and Kayla immediately felt bad for the statement.  “It’s just that when we jumped, we were completely separated.  I was in the truck, you were at the compound.  You can’t tell me that was the same location, it wasn’t. I was in that van driving for a long time.  And then—“

“Ok, yeah,” he said frustratedly, “but we’ve been more intimate than that and not arrived separated on the next jump, so I don’t know what that had to do with anything.  I mean, we didn’t actually do it either time you were drunk, Kayla, you think I was gonna take you while you were sleeping?”

“Let me finish.”  Steve let out a pfft and held up a hand in supplication.  “Then … then, we made love in Cleveland.”  She couldn’t help it, a tear ran down her face, and this is just where Steve was desperate not to go.  “Way before we ever did anything at all together.  Way before we had our first kiss in this very apartment right over there,” she tossed her head over her left shoulder to the stairwell.  “And now we’re suddenly not even jumping at the same time anymore.  It’s not just that we’re in different places, I’m leaving you behind.”  Another tear slid down her cheek. 

“Kayla, we messed around lots of other places, and we didn’t arrive separated.  There are other things we did that were very different, like the hayride and election night, and we didn’t arrive to the next place separated.”

“But Cleveland …”

“No, Kayla.  NO!”

Steve refused to believe that merely touching Kayla in a time that he hadn’t previously would throw them askew if pummeling that reporter or bugging out of the election night party didn’t.  And the truth was that Kayla didn’t really believe that, either.  But Cleveland … jumping without Steve … she believed that Cleveland did something.  That she believed.  Steve had already come to the same conclusion, but he just couldn’t bring himself to say it.  

“And ya know what, baby, I see other things on that list, too.  Like how about that we keep jumping to the loft, huh?  Why’s that?  Maybe it’s not about sex at the wrong time,” saying it out loud for the first time only agitated him further, “maybe it’s something about the loft, it’s the only place we’ve jumped to more than once.  Maybe we’re supposed to be doing something there that we just haven’t figured out yet.  Ever think of that?”

“Like what? There’s nothing consistent about our jumps to the loft.  Our first one was there, then we were there a few more times, none of them the same.”

“Baby, what about the poisoning?  We were there more than a week.  Its’ the only place we’ve been that long, maybe we should be looking at what’s triggering our jumps.”

“I thought about that.  Maybe.  But, our shortest stay was in the elevator, and it was a bad jump, we weren’t in a good place there.  But the only jump worse than that was the poisoning, and it was the opposite, we were there the longest. So what would we look for as a trigger?”

Steve didn’t know, so he moved on.  “What about all of our jumps being before we were married?”  Steve was starting to phone in this conversation, going on autopilot so that he wouldn’t have to face Cleveland.

“Steve, hello, undercover at the compound?  The house?  We were married already!”

He realized his error and cursed inwardly.  He was grasping at straws, trying to think of anything else that made sense.  Not that sex at the wrong time made actual sense, either, but he couldn’t deny that jumping out of sync was bad.  Really bad.  And the only thing they’d done in Cleveland that didn’t happen anywhere else was have sex.  Years before they did the first time.

“Couldn’t it just be that every jump is taking us farther and farther apart when we land?  We woke up on the couch together the first time, and now this last time …” Steve trailed off realizing that wasn’t actually the case and cursed again.

“No, we were right with each other between—“

“I KNOW!” he yelled, standing up and throwing up his arms. Then trying to control his tone, “Baby, I don’t see any patterns with any other jumps, but you’ve been worried about sex at the wrong time from the beginning, maybe your mind is just trying to make it fit there so you can explain it.”

“Maybe it is!  I don’t know!  But I’m scared, Steve!”

“Of what, of me?!” he yelled.

“No!  Of jumping without you! Of causing it ourselves and not knowing how!”

“You want answers, Kayla, Dimera’s your answer, dammit!  It’s Dimera doing this to us, I’m telling you!”

“How, with some magic time machine?!”  Now Kayla jumped up and stood facing him.  “I mean I’m sure, stranger things have happened with that monster,” she yelled back sarcastically, “and I dreamed … I dreamed something, I don’t know what, but maybe—ok—I DON’T KNOW!  But … but … I can’t help what I’m feeling, Steve.  You said just now, you said, you just want to be us again, doing whatever we want to do and not worry if we’re going to mess things up?”  Steve didn’t respond to her right away.  “Right?”

“Yeah, that’s what I said.”

“Because you think we messed things up in Cleveland, too.”

“I just want, to go home, Kayla, stop analyzing me!”

She ignored the words that she knew were said in fear.  “Yes.  You want to go home.  So we don’t have to worry about what we’re doing, if it’s going to mess things up.”

“I believe I said ‘fuck things up,’” Steve snapped again.

“Yep, you did.   So, maybe we fucked things up.”

Something in Steve snapped as he grabbed one of the spice jars in arm’s reach and hurled it across the room.  “Dammit!” he bellowed.  “It’s my fault, I did this!”  Then he grabbed another one and threw it harder.  Shards of glass mixed with oregano and coriander flew everywhere. 

“Steve!”

He reached for another one, but Kayla grabbed his arm.  He wrenched it away from her and let out another angry curse.  “I couldn’t keep my dick in my pants, Kayla! God what did I do?  What did I do?”

“You?  Steve, how can you say this is your fault?  If I recall, I was the one who couldn’t keep my hands off of you first.  In fact, I told you exactly what I wanted you to do to me.  It does take two, doesn’t it?”

“I busted out of that closet with one thing on my mind, baby. 

“And I ran out of the bathroom with the same thing on mine!”

“This is nuts, baby.  You’re my wife!  WE,” he pointed to her and then slapped his chest hard with his palm, “are MARRIED!  Married!  We are married!” he made the sign for “married” slipping his fingers over his left hand’s ring finger.  WE are not these bodies, WE are the people from 2009, Kayla!  How is it wrong for us to do anything?  So, I’m not supposed to make love to my wife?  Showing you that I love you in the wrong timeline did this to us?!

The vibe in the air was heated and to Steve’s utter ambivalence, his penis was hardening with remorseful lust and yearning.

Kayla didn’t need to feel him hard against her, she could see in his face that he wanted her, and she became just as aroused as he was as a result.  He saw her breathing hard and started to lose control.

“I love you Kayla.  You love me.  How could we have done this?

They looked at each other with heady desire pushing aside all thought. 

“God, I want you,” Kayla said huskily.

“I want you more,” Steve rasped. 

In the next instant, they were on each other, kissing with aggressive abandon in the same spot as their first kiss that took place just a short time ago.  Kayla ran her tongue over Steve’s lips as he nipped at her jaw and started clawing at her clothing.  He ran his hands over her breasts, feeling the firmness of them beneath the softness of her orange sweater.   He lifted it over her head as she unbuttoned her own pants.  Then she moved on to his.  She got the button open and zipper down, then shoved her hands into the back of them to tightly squeeze his ass before shoving the jeans down his legs.  As she did, his throbbing cock was released, and she immediately pushed him back on the bed, layed next to him, and took him fully into her mouth with a tight, hot suck.  Steve moaned loudly as he fisted the bedcovers and kicked off his pants.  “God, yeah, just like that, baby, just like that.”  Kayla continued licking and sucking as she gently squeezed his balls.  “Need you,” he panted.  “Need you, too.”

Kayla released him from her mouth and got up on her knees. Steve joined her on his and roughly tugged down her black pants and underwear while she took off her bra.  Steve lifted the button-down over his head, and they both collapsed back onto the bed kissing and fondling each other like there was no tomorrow, because they really didn’t know when tomorrow would be coming. 

Now naked in each other’s arms, Steve rapidly rolled on top of his wife separated her thighs with his knees and impaled her with his rock hard erection.  Kayla cried out at the sudden intrusion, but then she grabbed his ass with both hands and pushed him inside of her.  “Uhhh … Steve … I love you …”

“I love you, Kayla.”

“… I love you.”

Steve interlaced the fingers of both her hands with his, then brought them up to each side of her head and pinned them there.  He could feel how tight she was as he moved in and out of her and realized that her body hadn’t had sex in a long time.  The thought made him impossibly harder.  He kissed her lips, tasting her, and she tasted so sweet as she spread her legs wide for him to thrust into her over and over again.  She met each one by bucking against him until he felt his orgasm start to quickly crest within him. 

“Come for me … Kayla, come for me, baby.”

“Make me come!

Steve lowered his mouth to her breasts and sucked one into his mouth while releasing one of her hands to squeeze the nipple of the other breast.  She cried out, then he moved his mouth to the nipple he’d just squeezed and ran his velvet tongue over its tip.  He trailed his kisses to the spot on her neck that made her crazy.  All while he was still gliding in and out of her while she writhed in ecstasy beneath him. 

“Oh, Steve, yes!  Don’t stop!”  Steve could feel her start to come, the urgency of her whimpers driving him mad.  Kayla moaned freely with the sublime feel of his hard cock sliding over her engorged clitoris and Steve joined her with grunts of his own.  “Gonna make you come,” he clipped looking right into her eyes.  “Gonna make my wife come.  Scream for me, Sweetness!”  And that’s what she did as her orgasm overcame her.  Her body jerked hard in his hands, and he felt her slick walls contract around his cock.

“Steve …,” she sighed thickly as she felt the waves release intense pleasure within her.  “Mmm.”

Just then with thoughts of Cleveland in his head, Steve pulled out, flipped her over, then pulled her hips toward him so he could enter her from behind.  He encircled her abdomen and reached up to squeeze her breast with his other hand as he hard thrusted in and out of her.  Her sensitive clit set off aftershocks, and she almost couldn’t take it as she cried out her ecstasy.  While Steve felt her spasms tighten around his penis he moaned her name loudly as his climax washed euphoria through him.  “Baby … oh, Kayla, baby.”

Steve pulled out of her quickly, rolled her back over, and pulled her to his chest as she immediately nuzzled into him.  But rather than bask in the afterglow of their lovemaking, tears sprang to both of their eyes as culpability crept though them. 

“We did it again,” Steve said as his body recovered from the intense climax.  “I’m sorry, baby, I’m so sorry.”  His voice started to break as he ran kisses down her face.  “I just love you so much I can’t stop touching you.  I need to feel you.  I just need you.”

“Shh.  This isn’t right,” Kayla said.  “We shouldn’t be feeling this way for wanting to be with each other. For making love to each other. You’re my husband, I love you more than I know how to say,” her tears had started to roll down the corners of her eyes, “I have to show you this way.  And—and … and I refuse to feel like we did a bad thing.”

They were on top of the made bed, so when Kayla had started to shiver, Steve brought the edges of the comforter up over them like a wrapped bundle. 

“Sweetness.  Oh, sweetness,” he sighed heavily.  “Kayla, you’ve been worried about making love in the wrong time since this whole thing started.  “What if you’re right?  What if we’re jumping out of sync now because we made love in Cleveland?”

“Well … what’s done is done,” Kayla said with a confidence she didn’t feel.  “I’m not sorry for making love to you.”   Guilt nagged at Steve as he kissed Kayla’s temple.  “Maybe it’s just random, after all,” she whispered.  I mean, look at that reporter and when you took me from the Deveraux house.”  Kayla leaned in and kissed the scar on Steve’s cheek.  “We did things differently then, but we still jumped together.” 

Steve thought about it as he rested his right hand on Kayla’s breast and ran his thumb lazily over the peak of her nipple.  “You’re right about that baby.”  Then after a beat, “Or, maybe it just depends on what we’ve done.”

Kayla looked into Steve’s eye solemnly and curled her fingers into a beard that wasn’t there.  “You think it was the sex.  In Cleveland.  You … you think that was it, don’t you?”  Another tear rolled down her face.

Steve kissed her tear away, but not before shedding one of his own.  Then he nodded.  “Yeah, I do,” he whispered.

So did she.

They laid in each others’ arms for a few minutes, caressing skin and lips and faces and breasts.  The truth was that this was all just speculation.  A desperate grab at something that made sense, because nothing had scared them more than these two jumps where she went first, and if they could explain it, maybe they could control it.  Neither of them had any idea if they were right or wrong, they could be barking entirely up the wrong tree.  But their fears got the better of them, and they couldn’t help letting those fears eat at them.

“Steve?”

“Yeah, baby?”

“I don’t have a ring here.”

“Kayla, we don’t need a ring.  I do, anyway.” He brought her ring finger to his lips and kissed it.

“Me, too,” she started to sob.  “I do, too.”

“Don’t cry, Sweetness.”  Steve didn’t move, just continued to caress her.  “This is home base, ok?  When you jump, I’ll be right behind you, and if we’re separated, we meet here, ok?  And if we’re not sure, we have the Stockholm question.  That’s all we can do, Sweetness.  We’ve gotta keep movin’.”

Kayla nodded and wiped her cheek against the blanket.  “Steve, since we already did it in Cleveland, do … do you think making love here made it worse?”

Steve shook his head.  “No way to tell.  But … seems to me in for a penny in for a pound.  Not sure what more damage we could do.” 

Kayla tightened her hold on her husband and said, “no matter what happens, I’m not sorry we were with each other there.  Or here.”  Steve wanted to say the same thing, but he couldn’t.  His guilt overwhelmed him.  Kayla felt his hesitation even as he held her.   “Don’t stop being with me, Steve,” she cried.  “Please.  Don’t stop making love to me.”

Steve hated what he was feeling in her.  That she was afraid he wouldn’t want to be with her.  “We don’t know for sure that’s it.  Besides, if I could stop, Kayla, we wouldn’t be having this conversation.  If I could stop making love to you, stop being with you, you wouldn’t be crying right now.  In for the whole pound, Sweetness.  Not going anywhere.”

Kayla blinked heavily though her tears.  “I’m tired, Steve.  I’m so tired.  I just want to go home.”  Kayla cried herself to sleep wrapped up in a combination of Steve’s naked body and bedcovers as he shed silent tears of his own.  Home was not something they’d be finding anytime soon.  Not by a long shot.

Chapter Text

Find Me
Chapter 36

The lab was lit up like a Christmas tree.  Indicators were blinking everywhere and he wasn’t sure where to go first.  He’d wanted to nod off, but even if the numbers and printing reports were something he could nap through, the two alarms that suddenly started chiming within seconds of each absolutely weren’t.  He’d hoped to catch just a wink here or there during the constant analysis of their jumps, but these alarms weren’t the kind you could wait a moment on.

He ran to the master screen and couldn’t believe what he was seeing.  Their phases were even more out of shift from one another than they were before.  He couldn’t imagine what the two of them had done; it was a variable the scientist hadn’t planned for.  But his fascination was deep. 

Rolf had not had a challenge like this in years.  Not even back in the day when working for his master was fun.  Things had gotten dreary for quite some time, but now?  Now there was nothing he wanted more than to be in his lab and be awed.  Constantly awed by the work he was doing.  The veins of resentment had run through his scientific reverence like weeds wrapping around a rosebush.  Resentment for being sidelined as an observer, resentment in knowing he wouldn’t be getting any credit for his brilliance.  He had been angry that he’d been forced to do this in the first place, but now?  Now it was a labor of love, the grudge notwithstanding.

Rolf had paid his dues.  He’d done the bidding of others his entire life.  He knew how brilliant he was.  Einstein, Oppenheimer, Hawking; he knew what his place was amongst these geniuses, and that was above them.  They were the brilliant minds that turned corners in global human science, and he held them in the highest regard.  But Rolf wasn’t just in their league, he was chief among them, and he knew it.  Not just in intellect, but in results.  He didn’t theorize, he proved.  He didn’t try, he did.  His science had always been considered that of fiction.  His peers considered him the Dr. Frankenstein to their Pasteurs and Bohrs and Curies.  Rolf let out a snarky little laugh.  He knew Neils Bohr, and a bore he was.  He may have defined quantum mechanics, but Rolf, he harnessed it!  He was actually doing it!  If only his colleagues could see him now.  Then he reminded himself that maybe they could one day.

But not with numbers like this.

Rolf turned his attention back to the master screen and studied the phase shift.  The increase had been unexpected, and there was no obvious reason for it.  He turned back to the numbers their most recent jump had thrown and reminded himself that time was unquantifiable.  There was a reason slipstreams were unstable and that no one had been able to harness them.  Yet, Rolf said to himself. 

Just then another alarm sounded, and the master screen registered new movement.  Excitement grew in him, along with a healthy dose of frustration for the phase-shift.  He didn’t really understand it and would have to analyze the reports in detail, but clearly, they were now jumping out of sync.  He knew Dimera’s former soldier and his wife did something to cause it, but he didn’t know what, though he had some theories.  Whatever it was, it was enough to throw numbers that he couldn’t make head or tails of.  Things were definitely off.  Possibly indefinitely. 

Chapter Text

Find Me
Chapter 37

When Steve woke up the next morning, Kayla was sleeping soundly along side of him with her head tucked into his neck. The comforter had slid off of them in the night, and he could feel that her skin was prickly with cold.  He rolled them slightly to reach it and covered them back up with himself and the fallen edge of the blanket.  She let out a sleepy sigh but did not rouse. 

The sight of his beautiful wife in his arms after a surprisingly rested night of sleep warmed him from the inside out.  Even so, their revelation of the night before, real or imagined notwithstanding, weighed heavily on him.  He felt in his gut that making love in Cleveland caused them to begin jumping out of sync.  It defied explanation, but so did this whole journey.  Why is she going first?  Was it something she did?  Or that he didn’t do?  Was that really it at all?  He didn’t know, and his mind soon dredged up their list of jumps, looking for patterns that he eventually admitted to himself, just weren’t there. 

Steve turned his head toward the body his wife was living in.  He felt the undercurrent of guilt run through him for having touched her in Cleveland, but no matter which body she was in and what time they were being forced to leap to, he was her husband, he loved her, he was devoted to her and their family, and to deny themselves of each other seemed wrong.  It seemed like a lie. 

Steve placed a kiss on her head and Kayla mewled like a soft kitten.  Memories of their lovemaking in Cleveland filtered into his head making his groin stir with his need for her, and soon his fingers were lightly touching her arm as it rested protectively over his chest .  They’d spent weeks avoiding sex, just to be cruelly ripped away from each other at the height of their passion.  It was like a sick joke to know he was about to slip into her for the first time in so long, just to feel the jump begin.  It was a selfish impulse to take her right before they jumped away, and his punishment was having the heaven that it was to be inside her last mere seconds before having it taken away.  When he arrived he was wild with need to be one with her, but it was like a slap in the face to realize he was in Cleveland, in her closet, the very first time he’d ever seen her.  Shame had laced its icy fingers though his chest, but Kayla melted them away.  Kayla’s need to have her husband fill her and surround her and make her world explode had dissolved the truth of who he was in that time.  It didn’t matter.  She wouldn’t allow them to be defined by the bodies they were in.  Kayla was his wife, she needed him as passionately as he did her, and when he finally took her against the wall of her apartment he was desperate to push himself inside of her and stay there forever.  He’d made hard, merciless love to her that night, like a starving man who’d finally been allowed to eat. 

Then last night they were distraught and out of their minds over this new and unwelcome aspect to their jumps.  Steve had to find the security of his wife’s soft, warm, wet, and beautiful soul.  He had to join with her.  He reveled and took comfort in the exquisite ministrations of her mouth and tongue on his hard cock, but there was more fear-driven passion within him – fear of losing her in time – than he knew what to do with.  His passion for her last night had become a need to completely dominate her, make sure this body knew who it belonged to, that in any time, Kayla was his, he was hers, and her unimaginable pleasure was his alone to give her.  Her trust in him as he’d pinned her down and pounded into her roughly and relentlessly took his breath away.  Steve felt his soul become one with hers with every stroke of his penis, every tremor of their orgasms, every breath that screamed each other’s names, and every time they looked into each others’ eyes as he filled her with his cum.

Steve needed her like he needed to breathe.  Kayla.  My Sweetness.  If he had to stop making love to her on this journey he didn’t know what he was going to do. 

Steve’s chest was tight with love and longing that poured down his spine and pooled into the hardened flesh that was gently pressing against the leg that Kayla had draped across him in the night.  He was hard with need to be inside her again, showing her how much he loved her.  Steve shifted toward her so that he was facing her on his side, their warm bodies still protectively cocooned in the blanket.  He lowered his lips to her head, kissed her gently, then placed sweeter, gentler ones down her face.  When he kissed her cheek, he lingered there.  How many kisses had she laid upon the scar on his own cheek?  More than he could count. They were the most meaningful kisses she ever gave him, and he felt each one in his heart every time she gave him one.  He returned that love back to her own cheek and felt her eyes flutter open.

“Steve?” she sighed sleepily.

“Shh.”  He silenced her with a deeply tender and loving kiss.  “Shh.”

Kayla wrapped her arms around him.  The fear and anxiety of their lives was there the moment she opened her eyes, but the immeasurable safety she felt in his arms and in his bed were all he allowed her to feel.  Right now, in this moment, her only reality was the feel of her husband loving her. 

Steve trailed wet kisses down her neck to the spot where it met her shoulder, and Kayla sighed with pleasure.  He suckled gently on that spot, then ran his tongue over her ear. 

“My husband,” Kayla whispered as Steve ran his hand down her side to rub her soft, warm nipple with the pad of his thumb.  When it hardened, Steve ground his own hardness against her, finding her soft folds on the first try. 

Kayla moaned his name in a feather light whisper, then returned his kisses and lifted her leg slightly.  With nothing between them and still bundled tightly together, Steve reached his right hand down to caress Kayla’s bottom, then slipped gently inside of her.  She gasped in pleasure as she slightly arched her back.  Last night was hard and wicked with need; this morning was gentle and slow but no less passionate.  

Steve moved gently against her, then wrapped his fingers in her hair and brought her lips to his for a warm, languid kiss.  His hands still in her hair, he moved her head to the side so he could whisper his love in her ear.  “I love you, Kayla.  I’ll never stop loving you.  I belong to you.  I’ll never leave you.  I won’t survive without you.” 

Love for this man radiated out of every one of Kayla’s pores.  He felt it sink into him from her skin to his. 

Her vagina was like velvet against his penis.  She pushed against him, as they gently rocked back and forth inside their private world.  Steve pulled back to lock his eye onto hers, then brought his fingers to her plump, red lips.  Kayla kissed his fingers, then let her tongue dart out to lick at them.  He applied the slightest pressure to her bottom lip, and in response, Kayla gently sucked that finger into her mouth.  It was as hot and wet as the vagina Steve was tenderly loving.  He slipped his finger out and rubbed the wetness against her nipple.  She delighted in the electricity that shot from her breasts right down to her belly, causing her movements to hasten ever so slightly. 

Steve and Kayla’s moans filled the stillness of the room as Kayla watched the sexual pleasure and devoted love splayed across her husband’s face.  Steve caught her eye and smiled as his gentle plunges inside of her turned to thrusts.  The sunlight streaming in through the thick blinds lit up her hair in a golden gossamer as her tight home milked him.  They felt so emotionally connected to each other, so pure in their love.

Kayla had started to whimper.  He knew she was close from the grip she had on him and the way her face had twisted to an expression of need.  “Steve,” she called to him softly.  “Only you … forever.”  Steve’s heart soared.  He fell into a deliberate rhythm, strumming her tenderly with the same instrument that took her so unrelentingly  the night before.  His love for her was so limitless that he had no words to tell her.  He sped up his thrusts while she bent her head to kiss his tattoo. 

The sounds of his wife’s ecstasy humming through her brought on his own.  The tingle at the base of his spine teased the euphoria he sought for them both.  “I’m coming, baby, I’m coming!”  He didn’t want to deny her, but he couldn’t stop.  They hadn’t moved from their position on their sides facing each other.  Steve softly but firmly brought his left hand down to rub Kayla’s breast as he continued cradling her head with his right hand.  He had to come, and he would make very sure she came with him.  

“Mine, Sweetness,” his voice breathless.  Then embracing her tighter, “yours!”  One, two hard thrusts, and Steve felt her start to shudder.  “Come with me, baby … I’m …,” he felt the first clench of her release and he came hard.  “Oh God, Sweetness …”  One more thrust and her orgasm bloomed with ecstasy as he exploded within her, filling her with more of his seed.  Her muscles contracted around him, and he felt her love for him as her body shook in his arms.  They both cried out with their releases, then Kayla buried herself into Steve’s arms.  She panted and whimpered against him as her mouth rained kisses onto his neck and across his jaw before capturing his mouth in a deep and tongue-filled kiss.  She didn’t want to stop kissing him, she loved him so much.  “So good,” Kayla huffed between kisses, “You feel so good.”  She pushed against him once, and Steve sucked in his breath at the overstimulation.  But he refused to pull out of her.  He wanted to be inside her as long as he could.  They held tightly onto one another and cherished the afterglow of their emotional connection.  Finally, Steve rolled his hips slightly and gently pulled out of her with regret, taking their combined wetness with him as it slid down their legs.  Kayla crawled her upper half on top of him and layed her cheek against Steve’s tattoo.  He held her while they recovered, loving the feel of her weight upon him. 

When he felt her breathing slow to a normal rhythm he rolled them over to their favorite position with her bottom spooned into the crook of his lap.  They laid there silently in each other’s arms for a long time.  They each knew what they were facing, and they each knew there was nothing they could do to stop it. 

“I love you,” Kayla said.

“I love you, Sweetness.”

No other words were needed. 

Chapter Text

Find Me
Chapter 38

They dozed lightly for a little while, but eventually, the day was upon them, and they allowed themselves to talk about what was happening. 

“You’re still here, Sweetness.”

“Yeah, I don’t feel anything yet.  How long do you think it’s been?”

“Maybe half a day or so.  Did you sleep good?”

“Yes, I did,” she said as she snuggled against him.  “I woke up even better.”

Steve smiled and kissed the back of her head.  

She suddenly remembered something he had said in the loft.  “Steve, what was I doing when I leapt away from the Emergency Center?”

“What do you mean?”

“I left first, and you said I kind of ‘checked out’ when I jumped.  What did you mean by that?  What’s my body doing?”

Steve realized this was important and that they hadn’t actually discussed it yet.  “Well, first your face just went – blank.  The emotion was gone.  Like your body was just … I dunno, baby, like it was a destination or somethin’.  Once you left it, that was that.”

“You mean I didn’t say anything after that?”

“No, Sweetness.  Not to me, anyway,” but you might have said something to your broth – to John and Abe.”

She craned her neck back to look at him in confusion.  “Huh?”

“Baby, that last time they were there when we jumped, remember?  I jumped just like ten seconds later.  Your body didn’t have a lot of time to say anything before I left.”

“My destination body.”  She turned on her side and felt the slickness of their lovemaking on her thighs as she propped her head up on her elbow.  “That’s a good way to think about it, actually.  We’re us, but the bodies we’re in are the destinations we’re jumping to.”  She chewed on her bottom lip as she thought about this.  “So, did my destination body just go limp?  Was it like a puppet?”

“A puppet?”  Steve snickered.  “Baby, there’s no way you could go limp with my fingers inside you.”

“Come on, will you be serious please,” she laughed at his joke as she playfully pushed on his shoulder.

“Hey.  Puppetry is serious business.  I take the way my fingers make you scream my name very seriously.”

Kayla cocked her head and gave him an appreciative look.  “Really, though, what did my body do when I jumped?”

Steve thought about this carefully.  “Well, you didn’t go limp, it was almost the opposite, actually.  You just froze, and your face went blank.  You didn’t say anything or move before I had a chance to jump away …”  Then he realized it was slightly different the first time than the second time.  Kayla looked at him quizzically.   Steve sat up, and she followed him.  “When you jumped from Cleveland we were in a panic.  The last thing I heard was you screaming, and I remember your face being terrified and then going to just nothing.  You became just empty.  I shook you, you didn’t say anything.  I was crazy with fear, I didn’t know what to do, so I just held you to me, and then I jumped.  Really fast.  It was different at the Emergency Center ‘cause Roman dragged me off of you as you were leaving.  Did you hear me say I love you?”

“No,” she shook her head with love in her eyes, “I must have already jumped away when you said it.” 

“Well, I did,” he smiled.  “You froze up, went blank again, and then I had some words with Roman–John–whatever,” he gave up, “and I was gone.  So, I’m not sure what guy they ended up dragging off of you.”

“Words?  Did you guys get into it?”

“Does it matter?  Not like we’ll ever have to pick that up again.  But yeah, he didn’t want me kissing his sister and practically pulled me off you by my hair.”

“Oooh, baby, I’m sorry.”  Steve shot her a prideful look that said, Please, I got this, baby.”

“So, really, I don’t know what you were doing once you jumped from the Emergency Center.  But, you went blank both times, and I jumped right after, and your body never said anything while I was still there.”  Kayla absently traced the lines of Steve’s tattoo as she thought about this.  “What about me?”

“You?”

“You jumped to me, Sweetness— destination me.“

“And it was you, but it wasn’t …”

“This is the weirdest conversation I’ve ever had.”

“’… Cause it’s not like these people aren’t us, they are us.  Just, we haven’t lived all the way to who we are yet.”  Kayla darted her tongue out to lick, her bottom lip, and Steve tried not to grin so that she wouldn’t be distracted.  He wanted to know what it was like for her to arrive somewhere without him.  “When I jumped to the Emergency Center, it was the you that belonged in that time. We weren’t an us yet, and it was like I said before you were afraid to touch me.  I said some things like you were my Steve, but that destination Steve didn’t know what I was talking about.  I was …,” she trailed off.

“You were what, baby?”

“I was so embarrassed.”

Steve sat up straighter and turned a confused eye on her.  “Why would you be embarrassed?”

“I just,” she tried to let her hands do the talking, but it was hard to put into words, “I just didn’t know how to be with you.  It’s been a really long time since then, I didn’t know what you would think of me.  I was acting like the  woman you’d just made love to, not who I was to you then.”

“Oh baby, no.”  He reached for her hand and kissed it.  “I could never have thought anything bad about you, don’t ever think you need to be embarrassed around any version of me.”

Kayla smiled.  “And I love you for that.”  She kissed him sweetly.  “But I did.  I felt completely exposed and strange.  Because, think about it, you love me.  He didn’t know what to make of me once I started speaking in tongues back there.  Once I realized you hadn’t jumped with me, I clammed up.  I was afraid to say the wrong thing.  And I didn’t know you would be arriving that qui—“  Kayla stopped short.

Steve raised his eyebrow.

“Ten seconds?  You were only ten seconds behind me?”

“Yeah, maybe less.”

“That’s not possible.  I was with your destination Steve body for more than a minute.”

“What?!  No way, baby.”

“Yes, Steve, I was!”

“Kayla,” he said with a mixture of warning and unease, “I’m telling you, I left right after you. It was only ten or 15 seconds at the most.”

They stared at each other with this new wrinkle.

“How long in the loft, Kayla?” she was silent with puzzlement.  “How long ‘til I arrived at the loft last night?” he repeated more forcefully.

“A … a minute?  I think a minute.”

“You sure?”  She nodded, and his eye darkened as he wondered if this discrepancy meant anything.  “So, what was I doing when I jumped in?”  He saw that Kayla was becoming upset and tried to temper himself and not fly off the handle.  He reached out to her and cupped her face.  “Tell me what you remember, Sweetness.”

“I think it was a lot like what you said I was like when I jumped away.  You tensed up and froze in the position you were in, like at the Emergency Center, you had your hands on my shirt.   You just went stiff.  And … and now that I think about it, your face was kind of blank, too.  Then you suddenly took a really deep breath, and your whole face came back to life.  You acted like you, again.  The one I went to sleep with in 2009.  And I knew it was you.”

“I took a really deep breath?”

“Yeah, both times.  Like – like as if you’d been holding it or something.”  They remained quietly lost in their own thoughts for a moment, and then Kayla asked, “Do you see anything on your way from one place to another?”

Steve didn’t have to think about it, he already knew this, because it struck him so odd that he thought about it often.  “Not at thing, Sweetness.  One minute I’m there, and then something pulls me in the gut, I get dizzy and I can’t see straight, and then it’s like I’m falling into the next body, and I get nauseous when I get there.”

“There’s no, like, tunnel or lights or anything?”

“Nothin’, baby.”  Steve smiled.  “You trying to pull a Steve, here?  Lookin’ for a show to compare it to?”

“Not really,” she grinned slightly back, “I just wanted to make sure it’s the same for both of us.  It sounds like it is.”  She reflected a few seconds and added, “seems like there should be a tunnel, doesn’t it?”  Steve chuckled at his wife’s interpretation of time travel.

They both took a deep breath and Steve pulled her toward him to lay upon his chest.  “It’s been a tough couple of days, or however long since we left Cleveland.  But we’re together, Sweetness.”

Steve didn’t want to leave the warmth and security of the bed, but eventually he had to admit that his bladder was screaming at him.  “Nature calls, baby.”  Kayla moved over and chuckled as she patted his hip in acknowledgment.  “Don’t worry, I’m right there,” he said as he nudged his nose to the door that always seemed out of place with the round window in it. 

“It’s ok. I should really go, too.”

Grudgingly, he got up and walked into his bathroom, leaving her naked in a bed that he last slept in 20 years ago.  “What a dump this place was,” he said to himself as he dragged his eye across the small space while he peed.  “I did keep it pretty clean, though.”  Clean … Steve was dying for a shower.  He poked his head out the door and saw that Kayla was staring after him. 

“Need some help in there?” she asked teasingly.

“Naw, I think I’ve got it, Sweetness,” he winked with a classic shake.  “But I was thinking of taking a shower.  Then after a beat.  “I think you should join me.”

Kayla smiled and followed him into the bathroom where the full size tub filled half of the already tiny space.  Since they were already naked, there were no clothes to strip off. He started the water, grabbed a washcloth, sat down on the edge of the tub facing his wife, and proceeded to clean up the considerable amount of love spilling out of her. 

“The last time you did this was in our bedroom at home,” she said sadly.  “The night before our first jump.”  He’d cared for her so tenderly after their lovemaking that night, just as he did now.  “You said I’d thank you in the morning.  But then we woke up in the loft.”  Steve didn’t say anything, just looked up into Kayla’s eyes.  “Thank you for taking care of me.”  She wasn’t just talking about the shower.  

“I’ll always take care of you, Sweetness.”  And neither was he.

She ran her hand through his hair.  “We’ll take care of each other,” she smiled down to him. 

Kayla spread herself for her husband, feeling neither vulnerable nor self-conscious; she felt loved.  As he ran the washcloth across her lips, Kayla reached up and untied Steve’s patch.  He paused only briefly when he felt her slipping it off the spot he protected most.  They had loved each other in these bodies, and they couldn’t have trusted each other more.  As he cleaned his seed from her body, she ran her fingers gently across the familiar grooves where his eye once was; a scar that was no longer there.

“Been a while since you’ve seen it, hasn’t it, baby?  Not as ugly a scar since Homey fixed me.”

“Never was ugly to begin with,” she said seriously as she tipped his chin up to her with her finger.  “You’re beautiful to me.”

Steve tossed the washcloth into the sink with a wet plop.  “That’s another swish, baby.”

“Oh, come on, the net is four inches away,” Kayla teased, “that hardly counts.” 

“Oh it counts,” he smiled as he stood her up and pulled her into a gentle kiss.  Then they stepped into the shower and reveled in the hot water cascading down their bodies.  They lathered the soap onto each other and silently allowed themselves to be bathed by the other.  Steve stood behind his wife to wash her hair as he massaged his fingers into her scalp.  Little sighs of deep pleasure escaped her lips as his fingers hit the most pleasurable pressure points of her scalp.  He knew her so well.  He took a large handful of the soapy bubbles and ran them over her shoulders and collarbone, then reached around to work her pert breasts in slippery circles.  Kayla turned to face him and did the same for Steve’s hair, working the lather down his muscled chest.  They took their time, in silent enjoyment of each others’ bodies.  Kayla slid her hands around his chest, abdomen, and hips.  She didn’t have to look down to see that though he’d made love to her not one hour ago, he was already hard for her again.  She reached down and ran her fingers from his balls straight up the underside of his penis, making him moan softly.  She gazed at him through half-lidded eyes and began to firmly stroke the length of his raging erection.  It hadn’t been her intention to encourage his arousal, but something innate within her set her hands in motion.

“Again?” she asked with teasing invitation.

Steve wanted it, but he thought better of it.  “You know I want you,” he said with a kiss, “but I think your sweetness needs a rest, baby.”

“No it doesn’t,” she cooed as she continued to pump her fist over his hard flesh. 

“Baby,” her firm fingers wrapped around his manhood felt so good, “aren’t you sore?”

Kayla loved him so much.  He always put her first.  “Nope.”

“Kayla.”

“Ok, a little sore, but I’m aching more to have you in me than to have a rest.”

Steve sighed, “I can’t get enough of you, Sweetness.  We spent too long apart.  Now that we’ve opened Pandora’s box, I want to be in that box all day.  But, mmm baby,” he moaned, “I—I think we give it a rest, and if we’re still here tomorrow, you won’t be able to stop me.” 

He kissed her in a wet and tongue-filled kiss that made his dick want to impale her.  Which was fortuitous, because Kayla pulled herself away, turned to place her hands on the wall and pushed her rear into his stiff cock.  “Take me, again,” she pleaded. “Take me!”

The sensations she caused in him were impossible to deny.  He bent his knees, guided himself into her hot center with a forceful thrust, and immediately began pumping into her. 

“Baby …,” Steve groaned as he placed his hands on her hips for leverage, “Oh fuck, yeah, baby, you’re so tight.  How are you still so tight?” 

“Mm … Steve you feel so good in me.  It’s these bodies, they’re amazing.”

Steve stopped pumping, making Kayla turn her head.  “Kayla I love this young body of yours.  But there’s nothing I wouldn’t give to be inside the body sleeping at home in 2009.  That body turns me on as much as this one.  You know that, don’t you?”  Kayla didn’t say anything, so Steve placed a hand on the crook of her neck and squeezed as he shoved himself into her.  “Don’t you?”

“Yes, I – I believe you.”

He reached down with the other hand and squeezed her nipple.  “You don’t sound convincing Mrs. Johnson,” he admonished like he was just about to put her in time-out.  She yelped out as another hard thrust of her husband’s cock rubbed against her swollen clitoris.  “There’s no version of you,” he thrust, “that any version of me,” he thrust harder, “does not—want—to fuck—Kayla!”    

She got his point, and she smiled as the brief moment of insecurity passed. 

“You like this, baby?”

“Yes!”

“You like it when I make love to you like this?”

“Ooh, Steve, you know I do!”

“You want me to stop?”

“No!  Don’t!”

“Good.”  Then he pulled out of her, sat on the edge of the tub with his legs to the inside, and pulled her down to straddle him.  The water continued to pour hotly over them as her velvet glove sucked his cock inside of her.  Kayla rode him in immense pleasure as she moaned loudly over and over.  Steve sucked her breast into his mouth, and another orgasm began to build within her.  Even with Steve’s expert manipulation of her body, she was surprised that she might be able to come again. 

It was the fourth time in a very short time.  The fact that it was the fourth time in places that they hadn’t the first time occurred to her, but she pushed it away as he did exquisite things to her.  Just then her vaginal muscles had started pulsing.  She was moments from her release.  “Steve … St—uuuh! ... mmmm!”  Kayla screamed as the water cascaded down them.  The sound of Kayla’s ass slapping against Steve combined with the sounds of climax coming out of her that only he would ever hear drove him to madness as his own orgasm ripped through him and into her.  “Kayla!  Baby, oh you’re so … damn … good.” 

Kayla crumpled into him, and he held her tighly as she let her head loll onto his shoulder.  She was finally spent and couldn’t figure out how she was going to stand up. 

“You got me dirty again,” she told him again in mock rebuke.  “I thought we came in here to clean up.”

Steve laughed.  “Baby, baby,” Steve replied wounded, “You started touchin’ me with those bubbly hands, what’s a man supposed to do but make love to his wife?”

Kayla smiled, but then a nervous flutter disrupted her afterglow.   She lifted her head and looked at him.  “That’s four times.”  Steve nodded.  Kayla’s eyes became shiny with unshed tears.  “I’m not sorry.”

“I know, baby, I know.”

“I’m not.”  She remained stoic and refused to be upset after the unbelievable pleasure he’d made sure to give her.

“I know you’re not.”  The lines of worry reached her eyes, and he couldn’t take it.  “I think I’ve shown you that I can’t stop, Sweetness.  He laced his fingers with hers on both hands and kissed her.  “I’m not sorry, either.  I promise you I’m not.”

He kissed her tenderly, letting his tongue dart into her mouth to search for hers.  The truth was that part of him was sorry, because with every passing moment, he knew in his heart that Cleveland did this to them.  And he could have fought his need for her if he hadn’t entered her at Gabrielle’s house after the jump had started.  That selfish drive into her was the act he was sorry for. 

But he was done seeing the constant worry in Kayla’s eyes.  So, right here in this shower, he’d decided that this was the last time he was going to feel this way.  It was the last time he was going to blame himself and make her think that he regretted being with her.  With this kiss, he’d put his guilt behind him and simply love her, let her love him, and try to deal with each jump without each other one jump at a time.

“Now, Mrs. Johnson, my dick is real happy inside you, here, but I think it’s time to get back to our regularly scheduled program, don’t you?”  Kayla giggled.  “I don’t know why you’re laughin’, Sweetness, ‘cause some perfectly good hot water is goin’ to waste, here.  You know what’s gonna happen if we run out, right?  We’ll end up with a cold shower, then we’re gonna have to get back in that bed to get warm, and then my dick will just end up right back inside you.” 

“And that would be a bad thing,” Kayla teased.

“Terrible.  Now where’s that washcloth?”

Half an hour later, Kayla was finishing up in the bathroom with the limited amount of clothing and toiletries that would work for her here.  Steve didn’t have a hair dryer, a single stitch of her clothing, nothing.  She opted to put on a pair of Steve’s sweats and one of his t-shirts and tried to figure out what to do with her hair.

Steve had dressed and was now just a few feet away from her looking at himself in the mirror beside the bathroom door as he went to put his patch back on.  He stared at his reflection with curiosity.  It had been quite some time since his eye looked like that. When the thugs beat him up in Italy, his eye had already been repaired, and the scar of his present was very different from the scar of his past.  It’s not like this was the first time, he’d had his old face while Kayla was recovering from the poisoning, but overall it had still been years, and he still felt a strange mixture of comfort, disdain, and nostalgia every time he saw it peek down under his patch.  As Kayla had done in the shower, he ran his fingers over the grooves and ridges that had long replaced a once very nice-looking eye.  Then he smiled.  “Ya know why she didn’t flinch, man?” he whispered to his reflection, “’cause she loved your ugly mug even way back then.”  Kayla heard him talk to himself in the mirror and felt a warm happiness in her belly for how their love made him feel about himself.  She didn’t say anything, allowing him this moment to himself. 

Steve secured the patch onto his eye and turned to see Kayla shove a finger of toothpaste into her mouth.  He leaned against the doorjamb and appreciated how adorable she looked in his clothes. 

Kayla caught him staring at her.  “What are you looking at, Mr. Johnson?”

“Who me?  Nothin’, baby, I’m just checkin’ out the facilities here at Chez Steven Earl Johnson circa 1980-whatever it is.”

“Oh, and what’s the verdict?”

“The verdict,” he replied, “is that I think I need to fire my interior decorator.”  Kayla laughed, a sight Steve was very happy to see.

Kayla emerged from the bathroom opting to let her hair air dry, mainly because she didn’t have any other choice.  Steve grinned; she looked like a drier version of the woman that showed up at his door in the rain on more than one occasion.  The wet ringlets of her hair and mascara creating a blue shadow beneath her eyes caused memories of their early relationship to flood into him like a ton of bricks. 

“Baby, do you know how cute you are when you look like a wet raccoon?” 

“Well, I don’t suppose you have any makeup remover hiding anywhere, do you?” she asked with a smile in her eyes.  

Steve palmed the hair off her face and kissed her.  “Not on me, baby, no.  That’s ok, you look great.  Sorry I don’t have a robe for you or anything, this had to be before I bought all that new stuff.”

“New stuff?” she asked as Steve kissed her damp hair.

“Remember all those times we almost got to be alone together, but we kept getting interrupted?  There was one of those days we were gonna spend the time here.  I wanted to spruce up the place.  Make it nice for you, baby.”

“Oh, that’s right, I remember, you kind of redecorated,” she chuckled.  “Didn’t you change comforters?”

Steve nodded.  “I did.  In case we … did anything in the bed.”  Steve looked over at the ratty old comforter they’d just slept in, and a weird kind of irony struck him.  “I wanted fresh and new for you—us.”

“Ya know what?” Kayla asked hugging him.  “We’ve still got that white fuzzy thing in storage back in LA.”

“White fuzzy thing.”  He was stumped.

“Yeah, you bought this thing, I don’t know if it was meant to be a blanket or a rug, but it sure was somethin’ else.  It’s one of those things I never threw away after you died.  When I moved back here, I left some of our old stuff in storage, so it’s still there.” 

Steve kissed the top of her damp head and smiled.  “I think we should get all our stuff back when we get home.”

Kayla stiffened.  There was nothing more she wanted than to go home.  If she lingered on this she was going to cry again, and right now she felt good in his arms and in this place, and she didn’t want to dampen any of it with the sadness of missing her home and her children.  Still, the word he used …

“When?”

“Yeah, baby,” he sighed, “when.”

Kayla took a deep breath of her own.  “Ok.  When.  When we get home, we’ll get all our stuff out of storage.”

“And I wanna see this fuzzy thing, too.”

“Oh, that goes without saying.”

Steve smiled and brushed his lips against hers. 

Now they were faced with something that they’d never had to think of before.  They hadn’t jumped yet, they didn’t have anyone to hide from, she wasn’t married to anyone else, it wasn’t unusual for them to be seen together in this time, and they didn’t have any explaining to do to anyone. 

What that all boiled down to was that they had no idea what they should do next. 

Chapter Text

Find Me
Chapter 39

“So …,” Kayla said, “what do we do now?”

Steve hadn’t thought this far ahead.  Their jumps were so strange of late that he really hadn’t expected to wake up here, let alone get this far into the day.  He wasn’t really sure what they should do now, though with the scent of bacon wafting into the apartment from Shenanigans above, the first thing that came to his mind was go eat something.

Kayla, on the other hand, had given this some thought.  This Kayla was expected somewhere.  Specifically, work.  She knew she was working at the Emergency Center during this time, because this was just after Adrienne had come to town and started working there with her.  

“Maybe I should go to work,” Kayla said.

“At the Emergency Center?” 

“Yeah, before it was rebuilt, the old one on the riverfront.”  Steve ran his hand through his hair as he mulled this over.  “I don’t know what day it is, but my guess is that I’m expected there.”

It wasn’t long ago on a previous jump that they’d argued about whether or not they should take over the lives of their destination bodies while on these jumps. He’d been so sure that it didn’t matter what they did because nothing was, apparently, sticking.  Kayla’s argument was that if they strayed that it would affect their lives while they were living them.   Now with their jumps completely messed up, he didn’t know what to think.

“Do you want to go to work today, baby?”

“I don’t know, really.  Maybe?” 

She sounded completely unconvinced, and Steve thought maybe they should take it in small steps.  He stepped away from her and looked out the window up to the alley.  “You want some breakfast?” he asked with hope in his eyes.

“I am kind of hungry,” she said.

“Kind of hungry?  Baby, I’m famished.  I could make us something here, but I’m spoiled now, I don’t wanna have to deal with the hotplate.  Shenanigans is right up there.”

Despite her suggesting that she go to work, leaving the apartment made her nervous.  “I don’t know, Steve.”

“Aw, come on, it’s the perfect time, we can be seen together and not have to explain it.”  She gave a non-committal reply, and Steve leered at her.  “We could always do my favorite breakfast, see if you can still keep up with me, how’s that sound?”

Kayla shot him a look that said she wasn’t born yesterday.  “You’ll be drinking down that egg in your beer alone this time, thank you very much.” 

Steve howled in laughter at the memory of Kayla getting way in over her head and downing the slimy mixture anyway, just so that he wouldn’t have the satisfaction.  “Actually, baby,” Steve said rubbing his stomach, “I do think we should go eat.  One of us is bound to have some money somewhere, I mean we did then, so I’m sure we do now.”

“Well, what if we run into someone we know?”

“What if we do?  It’s ok now.  This is the exact right time, I don’t even think Jack’s in town yet, is he?” 

Kayla wasn’t enthusiastic.  “I don’t know, it’s hard to keep track, I’m struggling just to remember my address and who’s president.”

“Bush?”

“Reagan.”

“Wow, we’re that far, huh?”

“Well, I think it’s 1987, so yeah.”

Steve leaned against the brick wall and watched her fidget by the hot plate.   “Sweetness, I know you’re scared.”

“I am scared, Steve.  I mean, I don’t remember things I’m supposed to know right now, did you see how Adrienne looked at me when I almost left without my coat and purse last night?  I have to think about the details of my life from 20 years ago.  Do you know how hard it is to remember little things, like where you used to keep your keys?”

Steve tried not to balk but glared at her anyway.  “Yeah, baby,” he said as he crossed his arms in front of him.  “I have recent experience with that.”

She’d said the wrong thing, and she knew it.  Steve looked back out the window. 

“I’m sorry,” she said softly.

“You’re the one who suggested going to work, I don’t know why you’re backtracking now.”

“Steve?”

“What?” he clipped, not getting her attitude at all.

Kayla walked up behind him and put her hands gently on his shoulders, but he kept staring out the window.  She leaned her head between his shoulder blades.  “I’m sorry.”

He finally acknowledged her by placing his hand over hers at his shoulder.

“What are you scared of?” Steve asked her, turning his head back toward her.

“I don’t know,” she said.  “It’s safe here.  That’s all I know for sure, right here, with you, we’re safe.”

“We’re not, though, Kayla.  You know we’re not.  Being in this apartment doesn’t mean we’re not going to jump again.  And aren’t you the one who’s said a million times that we shouldn’t stray too far from what we’re supposed to be doing since we don’t know how long we’ll have to live in these bodies?”

Kayla sighed, not having any real answer to that.  He turned his head back toward the window and watched as people walked through the alley.  

“Kayla, part of me wants to just sit here and wait to jump, but we don’t have any clue when you’re going or where it’s to, so we may as well enjoy that no one’s after us for a change.  We’re not gonna remember everything, I know.  We’ll just do our best.”

Kayla hated that he wasn’t looking at her, clearly still stung by the foot she’d shoved in her mouth.  So, she turned him to face her.  “I’m sorry for what I said.”  She kissed him, and he kissed her back before slipping his arm around her.

“Sometimes it’s still hard for me, Kayla.  But here we are, finally, in a time that we don’t have to make ourselves fit into.  I don’t know how long we’ve got, but let’s just go out there.”

“So, you’re saying I should go to work, then.”

Steve put his hands on his hips and said, “Yeah, I think I am, baby.  You practically owned that joint, I’ll bet the minute you walk through that door you’re going to just fall right back into it like you never left.”

Kayla was warming to the idea, but apprehension tugged at her.  “We might jump in ten minutes.”

Now Steve was getting frustrated.  “And we might jump in ten days, Kayla.  Now that we really don’t need to, we shouldn’t hide here.”  The more he said it the more he believed it.

“I don’t want to be separated from you.  I don’t want to risk that.  If we leave here then we could be separated, don’t you see that?”

Unfortunately, he didn’t have any answers that would satisfy either one of them.  “Baby, I think that ship has sailed.  You’re jumping first now, I’m following.  Now it was Kayla’s turn to cross her arms in frustration.  “Listen to me, now.  I want to go home to 2009 to Joey and Stephanie and our old bodies.  But we’re not there right now.  We’re here instead.  We’ll be somewhere else next.  It’s just an ordinary day, here.  We can’t be afraid to live.  You’re the one who told me that.  We’re going to have to do basic things.  If we have another one of those week-long stays or even longer, we’re going to run out of reasons we can’t leave each others’ sides.  What do you think your mama’s gonna say when I go, ‘hold on, Caroline, I have to accompany your daughter to the bathroom?’”

Kayla relented.  “Ok, you’re right,” she sighed.  “I know you’re right.  I’ll go to work.”

“That’s my girl,” he said embracing her. 

“You’re coming with me, though, aren’t you?”

“You think I’m letting you out of my sight?  You get to take bathroom trips alone, but I’m not hustling up a game of pool while you go to the Emergency Center.  Yeah, I’m coming with you.  I did a pretty good job hanging around back then didn’t I?”

“Yeah,” Kayla chuckled, “I think you made making excuses to see me at the Emergency Center your full time job, actually.”

Steve bent to kiss her, and he smiled.  “Worked out pretty good, too.  I ran a tight ship over there, ya know.”

“Yes, I do, as a matter of fact,” she chuckled.

“So, breakfast first, then we’ll get you some clothes at the loft.”

Kayla tensed.  “Can we skip Shenanigans?”

Steve looked at her.  “Baby, it’s right here.  Gotta eat something.”

“Maybe we can drive through a McDonalds.”

“Ok,” Steve raised his voice in utter frustration.  “What’s going on with you, Kayla?  Why won’t you go to Shenanigans?”

“I’m not really dressed, Steve!  Is it ok if I don’t want to be seen like this? 

Steve huffed in exasperation.  “Like what?”

“Look at me!  I’m dressed in your clothes, not wearing any underwear, I might add, and it’s obvious that I spent the night with you!”

“So what if you did?  You got a problem with that?”  That stopped her short.  “Who cares, Kayla?  Do you really care what people think?  You never did before.” 

That’s not what she meant.  It wasn’t about that at all.  She didn’t care what anyone thought, then or now.  She walked up to him, but his arms were crossed in front of his chest, and he wasn’t opening to let her walk into them. 

“No,” she said, looking into his eyes as the morning light shined upon them.  “I don’t have a problem with it.  In fact, I want everyone to see that I’m yours.”

“You sure about that?”

“I’m saying all the wrong things this morning,” she sighed dragging her hand over her forehead.  “Yes, I’m really sure.  It’s not really about the clothes, though I would like to get some underwear on.”  Steve smirked despite being truly annoyed with her.  “I’m just worried about the unknown.”  Steve glared at his wife unsure what to make of her.   She put her hands on her hips and tried to make him see that he took her words wrong. “Come on, Steve.”

“People are gonna know you spent the night with me.  Oooh, alert the coffee klatch, Nurse Brady slept with the hoodlum.”

“Steve!”

“Not like we’re married or anything!”

“Now you’re just trying to hurt me.”

“Well, you just hurt me!”

“I said I was sorry,” she whimpered, knowing that if she’d meant what he thought she did that she would have deserved his anger; but she didn’t, he was flying off the handle, and it made for a very hard time getting that foot back out of her mouth.  “Listen to me, Steve!” she said forcefully.  “I’m not ashamed of people thinking I slept with you!  I just don’t know Kayla Brady anymore.  I don’t know what Kayla Brady would tell people if they noticed.  I’m Kayla Johnson, and I know how I react.  But I haven’t been Kayla Brady in a really long time.  I’m not sure how this Kayla is supposed to react!  I don’t know what I’m supposed to be doing!” she yelled.

“Well, welcome to my world, Kayla!” he yelled back.  For months before I got my memories back, that’s how I lived every single day, knowing that this was what my life was supposed to be but not knowing how to live it!  Sucks, doesn’t it?”

The hair stood up on the back of Kayla’s neck.  “Oh my God, Steve …”  The truth of his words were powerful.  For the first time, she got it.  She really, truly got it.  She’d never understood on a truly empathetic level.  Now she did.  Remorse flooded through her.  “I—I didn’t know.  I’m sorry.”

Finally, Steve opened up his arms and let her in.  She held on to him, and Steve laid his cheek on the top of her head.  “You know what’s crazy about this, Sweetness?  You were the one trying to get us in bed these days.  You wanted us to be together and didn’t beat around the bush about it.”

She looked up at him.  “I don’t care who notices,” she said meaningfully.  “I don’t want you to think that.  I don’t know how you could think that.  I know it sounded that way, but it’s not about what people will think – I don’t care what anyone thinks.  It’s about reacting like 1987 Kayla.  I don’t remember her that well anymore.”

“Well, I remember her just fine.  She loved me, tried to get me to tell her I did, too, and wasn’t shy about any of it.”

Kayla exhaled deeply.  “Ok,” she said with confidence she willed herself to build.  “If you’re with me, then I can do it.  Let’s go eat.  Underwear can wait.”

Steve laughed.  “Underwear’s optional.”

An hour later they had finished breakfast with no one so much as looking their way other than Joey, who was more than happy to get very chatty with them.  Steve and Joey were always happy to make small talk, and Steve actually really enjoyed the conversation as Kayla looked on.  He almost thanked the bartender for the help while Kayla recovered from the atropine, but he stopped himself when he remembered that this Joey wasn’t part of that jump and would, therefore, have no recollection of that. 

“Hey, you got a newspaper, man?” Steve asked him.

“You know I do, Steve.”  He grabbed it off the bar and tossed it onto their table.  “Take it with you, morning rush is about over.”

“Thanks, Joey,” Steve smiled. 

“Don’t mention it, buddy.”

“Hey, bring me the damage, will ya, we’ve got to get going.”

“You got it.”

Kayla looked on at Steve’s easy rapport with the man that had her son’s name and enjoyed hearing him say it.  It somehow made her feel closer to their little boy hearing his name out of his father’s mouth.  “You’re right,” she said,” this wasn’t hard at all.”

“Told ya, Sweetness.  And we even got bacon out of it,” he jibed.

Just then the bill appeared on their table, but the hand attached to it wasn’t Joey’s.  “Well hey there,” Chris said as he dragged a chair over and sat down between Steve and Kayla. 

“Chris!” she blurted.  “Hi —um … hi!” 

“Interesting outfit you’ve got on there, Kayla.”

Steve watched Chris look from Kayla’s eyes to her boobs and back up again.  He knew Chris was no threat, but he never really liked the guy, either.  Even when he was representing Steve as his lawyer, he wasn’t Chris’s biggest fan.  Interestingly, he never had any problems with Mike, who’d dated Kayla once, too, but Chris he could do without.  Maybe it was because he knew Chris had slept with Kayla.  He wasn’t sure.  But hearing him comment on her appearance, exactly what Kayla didn’t want to have happen, didn’t ingratiate the guy to him.

“Comfort’s the new black,” Steve said, “don’t you read the style pages?”

Chris looked from Kayla to Steve and said, “I don’t think you and I have the same taste in reading material, Patch.”  Then he turned back to his ex-girlfriend and said, “So, Kayla, you know how to start a man’s day off right, here.  What brings you in so early?”

“She’s eatin’ breakfast,” Steve answered for her, “most important meal of the day.”

“That it is,” he replied, keeping his eyes on Kayla.  “That it is … So,” he prompted, letting the rest of the sentence drop as he grinned at her.

“Kayla and I were just leaving, Kosichek.”

Chris was getting annoyed at Steve’s insistence on talking for Kayla.  He didn’t really like her hanging around with him, but he knew a long time ago that she had a mind of her own and would eventually speak up.  Until then, Chris glowered at Steve and tried again. 

“Kayla,” Chris repeated with heavy emphasis.   “What’s goin’ on?”  He sized her up and down again to drive the point home that she looked like she was possibly taking the proverbial walk of shame.  Steve really didn’t like where Chris’s eyes were.

She saw Steve watching her and wanted to be sure to not say yet another wrong thing.  “She looked Chris square in the eye and said, “Well, Steve and I,” (she hated hearing people call her husband Patch), “decided to get some breakfast before he runs me back to the loft so I can get changed for work.”

Chris just stared for a moment, caught completely off guard.  “Runs you back?”

Kayla stuck a fork in her eggs and moved it around the plate as she looked her smiling husband in the eye.  “Yeah, I can’t very well wear the same clothes as yesterday.”

“Really?” Chris said a bit stunned.

“Yes,” she replied.

Chris didn’t know what to say.  She was basically admitting that she’d slept with him, and he was, frankly, not thrilled.  He always saw her as the one that got away, but then when he’d really think about it he’d realize that while she was special to him, he was never going to actually love her.   Still, the shock of her choosing Patch?  He wasn’t expecting that.

“So, you two are a couple now?”

Kayla continued to look at Steve as she answered Chris’s question.  “Yes, we are.”  Steve smiled, and Kayla smiled back.

Chris was baffled.  But he wasn’t about to fight for her or anything.  Kayla was a headstrong girl, and he just hoped she knew what she was doing, because this guy seemed like bad news to him.

“Well, alright,” Chris said with as much fake happiness as he could muster.  “Congratulations, then, you two, I won’t keep you.”

“Thanks, Chris,” she said squeezing his hand.  “We’re going to head out now.”

“Alright.  See you later.”  Chris then got up and fixed a look on Steve that said what he really thought of him, then said, “tell you what, I’ll just put this on your tab, how’s that?  Help get you on your way quicker.” 

Steve looked at Kayla with a mixture of surprise and triumph and said, “I have a tab.”  Then he met Chris’s gaze and rolled his eyes.  “Goodie.”

“Great!” Kayla said, “Thanks, Chris.”  Then he walked away.

“Well, that went well,” Steve snarked.

“Actually,” Kayla stuck out her chin, “I think it went very well.”

“He sure liked your tits.”

“Yes, well, I certainly let him know just who these tits belong to, now, didn’t I?”  Steve’s cock reacted to her use of the word “tits,” and he willed it to stay where it was.  “I hope that puts an end to you doubting me.”

Steve reached for her hand and kissed it.  “We’d better get you dressed before I lose my will and bring you back downstairs.”

Twenty minutes later Steve was watching Kayla dress.  They’d arrived at the loft prepared to field questions from Adrienne, but to their surprise she wasn’t there.  That was fine with them, one less complication to navigate.  Clothing, however, was a complication they hadn’t considered.  Just like her first jump to the mansion, most of the clothes in her closet were completely bizarre to her now, and choosing an outfit was hard.

The pants and skirts were actually fine, but she groaned as she went through one top after another trying to find something that didn’t scream 80’s ridiculousness.  “What’s with all the sequins?  Did I own anything that didn’t shimmer?” 

“Are you kidding, Sweetness?  My baby was always a fashion plate.”

“Really?  Have you seen the cowgirl theme I had going here?  What’s with this cactus shirt?  Heinous.”

Wait a minute,” Steve said.  “I know that shirt, don’t knock that shirt.  You wore that shirt when I proposed to you.”

“I did?  After you told me Jack was Billy?”

Steve was amazed that she didn’t remember.  “No, baby, when you were deaf.  I asked you to marry me, and you said no.  It about killed me, I won’t ever forget what you were wearing that day.”

“Oh … Well, that might explain why I don’t remember.  Saying no to that question is not something I remember fondly.  I wasn’t in a good place then.”

“Nope, you sure weren’t, Sweetness.  But you came around,” he smiled.

“I was a bit self-absorbed.”

“Nah, you were workin’ stuff out in your head is all.”

“Well, if we ever go back there, I won’t be saying no again.” 

“Yeah, well, till then, don’t say anything mean about that shirt.  I love that shirt.”

“Yeah, ok … I’m putting it back, just the same.”  Then she took out the next top and blanched.  “What on earth is this?”

Steve saw the black shirt and started laughing so hard he had to roll on his side. 

“Clocks?!  I know it was the ‘80’s, but these gold clocks are … this is the dumbest thing I ever wore.”

“Woo!  Oh, Sweetness!” he got out between guffaws, “I dunno what was goin’ through your head on that one, but that shirt stuck around at least a whole ‘nother year, baby!

“Ugh,” she groaned.  “I have nothing to wear.”

“Oh no you don’t, you’ve got plenty in there.  Just pretend you’re going to a costume party.”

Kayla gave him a mock pout as she tried not to bust up laughing, herself.  Then she realized … it really is the 1980’s.  “Well, when in Rome,” she said out loud. 

Steve watched her suss out her quandary with a grin on his face as he layed on the bed with his hands under his head.  Finally, she chose a long black skirt over bikini underwear, black boots and a yellow turtle neck sweater with sizeable shoulder pads.  Steve enjoyed watching her dress and noticed that unlike 20 years ago, she went with bare legs under the skirt this time. 

“What are you gonna do with your hair, baby?  You gonna put it up in a fancy braid?”

“No,” Kayla said after thinking about it.  “That’ll take too long.  I think I’ll just throw it into a pony tail.” 

In record time, she was ready to go with a bag of enough similarly bad 80’s-wear packed to last a few days.

Now they stood at the door of the locked Emergency Center ready to face whatever the day would bring. 

Chapter Text

Find Me
Chapter 40

She fished on her key ring for the one that would open the deadbolt and was rewarded on the first try.  The antiseptic smell hit them in the face, and memories just flooded both of them.  Even though they’d both just been there on the previous jump, it wasn’t quite the same.  The shock of a new location that was familiar to them and held part of their history was strong.

“Wow,” Kayla said. 

“Yeah,” Steve replied.  “Huh.  Man, this feels weird.”

“But it’s a good weird.  It’s a really, really good weird.”  She was so glad he’d convinced her to do this.  It felt right.

Kayla stowed her purse in the filing cabinet, and Steve strutted around the small waiting room.  “Well,” she said, “I guess I’ll get the exam rooms ready for patients.”  Steve replied ok, and they stared at each other.  Kayla didn’t move.

“You ok to do this, Sweetness?”

“I think so.”

“You can do it.”

Kayla nodded.  “Ok.”  Then she turned and headed to the back rooms.  Suddenly, Steve felt a surge of panic.

“Wait!”

Kayla whipped her head back around, her skirt rustling a shushing sound as she did.  “What’s wrong?!”

Steve went to his wife and held her tight.  Then he kissed her and held her again.  “I talk a good game, but now that it comes down to letting you actually go back there without me, I’m … I just need another kiss.”

She brushed her lips onto his, and she tasted so sweet.  Kayla melted into his embrace and inhaled his Steve scent.  “Come with me.”

It was so easy, of course, just go with her. 

“No,” he heard himself say.  “We’ve got to do this, Sweetness.  We both have to be able to do this.”

Kayla looked up at him.  “You’re right.”  She gave him a quick peck on the cheek and then pulled out of his embrace.  “Ok, then … here we go.”  Steve winked at her.  “I’ll be … right back there.”  She then turned on her heel, looked back at him and saw the smile he was forcing, and disappeared behind the curtain of the back exam rooms.

Kayla entered the first room and tried not to panic.  Just calm down.  She stood with her back purposely to the doorway and forced herself to calm down.  Frontal bone, parietal bone, temporal bone, occipital … bone.  “That’s not helping.”

“Kayla!”  Steve yelled.

Startled, she gasped and ran back to him.  “Yes?!”

Steve smiled.  “Just checking.”

Kayla smiled back and was somehow calmer.  Without saying anything, she turned and went back to the room.  She immediately set to the task of making sure it was stocked with whatever might be needed.  First aid, supplies, paper rolls for the exam tables, sheets, drapes, gowns, antiseptic.  Before she knew it, she was ready to check the next room. She fought the urge to call out to him only because she heard him doing his own thing out there.  He was right, she fell right back into this without much confusion.  She then headed to the drug cabinet to take stock.

For his part, Steve was a nervous wreck.  He really didn’t like her not being in eyeshot, but at the same time, he’d known for a while now that they were getting on each others’ nerves.   He hated it, and he didn’t want to think it, but it was the truth, and it was why they had that spat this morning.  The fact was that they’d been in each others’ hair 24/7 for he didn’t know how long but his guess was weeks.  Without a break.  Without another real source of social proactive interaction.  Not a moment of alone time unless you counted the panicked moments jumping apart.   They needed this.  For their own goods, they really did.  That didn’t mean Steve was having an easy time of it.

He heard her in the exam rooms opening drawers and fumbling with cabinets, so he set about the task of checking out the front desk. He found intake forms, clipboards, paper, pens, pencils, a rolodex, an analog touchtone phone that made him happy just looking at it, and to his surprise, a schedule.  Sure enough, Kayla was on it as the nurse on duty not just today but tomorrow and the day after that, as well.  He didn’t recognize the doctor listed, but he did notice the time, 9:45am, and the doctor was 45 minutes late.

He spotted the lab coats on the hook to the right and decided to put one on.  As fate would have it, the first one he grabbed had a name sewn onto the breast pocket.  Kayla Brady, R.N.  “It’s your lab coat, baby.”  As if on autopilot, he brought it to his nose and inhaled; the déjà vu was overwhelming.  It smelled just like the woman he’d harassed like a schoolboy with a crush all those years ago.  Visions of her came flooding to him, and he almost couldn’t take it.  He had to see her in the coat. 

He found her at the drug cabinet, and she gasped in surprise.  “Steve!  You scared me.”

“Sorry, Sweetness.  Baby, look what I found.  It’s your lab coat.”  He held it up to her so she could see her name etched into the fabric, and her eyes went wide. 

“R.N.  Wow, R.N.”  She put it on and asked, “how do I look?”

She was the very picture of the Kayla Brady he’d fallen in love with all those years ago.  “Beautiful, Kayla.  You look …”

Just then they heard the door open.  Kayla started for the front, but Steve stopped her.  “No.  I’ll go.  You go back to what you were doin’.”

Steve came back up front to see a middle-aged woman had walked in that was now gingerly holding her left hand up in front of her.  “Excuse me,” she said to Steve, “are you the doctor?”

Steve had his first customer!  “No, my wi—uh, no, the doctor’s not in yet, but the nurse is.”

“Well, I just slammed my finger in a door, see?”  She held her hand out to him, with her middle finger appearing to flip him the bird.  “And it’s killing me!  Can she help me?”

“Baby, are you tryin’ to tell me something with that finger of yours?”

“Yeah, that my finger hurts!”

“Ok, keep your pants on, baby, Nurse Kayla’s gonna fix you right up.”

By now Kayla had run out of patience and came to the front to see who’d arrived and was pleased to see that she was about to treat her first patient of the day. 

“Hello!” she said.  “I see we’ve got a patient, Steve.”

“Yep, went and got herself a booboo.”

“Ok, well what seems to be the problem?”

“I hurt my finger!”

“Now, just hold on, this nice lady needs to fill out an intake form,” Steve said.  “Gotta do things right, now.”

“But I’m a lefty, I can’t fill that out.”

“Well, this is your lucky day, because we have a two for one special going on right now, people with two eyes get to have their intake forms filled out by people with just one.”  The lady smiled.

“He thinks he’s a comedian,” she said, momentarily forgetting the throb in her finger. 

“Only for you, baby.  Now, let’s start with your name, and by the time we’re done, that finger will be all patched up.  Get it?” he said tapping his patch with the pen.  “I’m the right guy for this job, aren’t I?”

The woman laughed, and Steve started processing her so that Kayla could treat her.  Kayla loved how he always knew how to work with people, appease them, and make them laugh.

The doctor finally walked in at 10:15, by which time six more patients had taken up residence in the exam rooms and spilled over into the tiny waiting room.  Steve didn’t notice because he was too busy holding down the considerably crowded fort, so the doctor cleared his throat and said, “are you the new reception volunteer?  I thought that was a woman.”

Steve looked at him and realized right away that this was the doctor.  “Yeah, I’m the new volunteer.  Name’s Steve Johnson.  Thanks for checking in, as you can see you’ve got lots of customers.”

“Sorry, rounds ran long.  Where’s the nurse.”

“She’s in back setting a broken arm.”

“By herself?” asked the freshly minted resident.  “Without a doctor present?”

Steve thought about saying that she was a doctor in a parallel universe but figured that wouldn’t go over well.  “Well, as you can see, Dr. Rounds Ran Late, we’ve got a bit of a full house goin’ here, and someone had to start treating people.”

“That’s Dr.  Windsor,” he said irritatedly.

“Well, cherrio, then, my fine chap!” he retorted in an English accent.  You’ve got an ear infection in 2, some kind of nasty shit crusting up an eye in 4, and someone who just ‘hurts all over’ in 3.  Like I said, my wife is in curtain 1 with the broken arm. Then you’ve got these fine folks—“

“Your wife?”

Steve didn’t even realize he’d said that.  “My what?”

“Your wife is the nurse?”

“Girlfriend.  Sorry, I meant my girlfriend.”  Dr. Windsor just stared.  “Wife’s back at the mansion.  Shh, don’t tell her.”  The annoyed doctor frowned at him and grabbed the intake list.  “So,” Steve continued, “what’s it gonna be, the ear infection or the crusty shit?”

Dr. Windsor decided to rise to the occasion, leaned in to Steve behind the desk and said, “Tell ya what, smartass, I’ll take the crusty shit, you go back and tell Nurse Brady to stop treating that arm till I get there, then go babysit ‘Hurts All Over’ till the nurse gets there.  How’s that?”

Steve was impressed.  A man willing to go toe to toe with him.  He smiled and let out a hearty laugh, then headed back to curtain 1.

Kayla had just gotten done putting the temporary splint on the dock worker’s arm when Steve appeared.  “Well, hi there,” she said with a smile, “How’s it going out there?”

“Well, we’ve got a Dr. Windsor who’s shown up.  Seems rounds ran late.”

“Mmm,” she grunted.  “Likely story.”

“Yeah, well, you’re not gonna like what else he said, either.”  He proceeded to tell her the doctor’s instructions, and as he suspected, she didn’t take that well.  She left the patient telling him that the doctor would be right in, and whispered with Steve in the waiting room corner as the patients watched them. 

“What was I supposed to do, let them sit here?  I’m a doctor for goodness sake!”

“No, baby, not here you’re not.  Not as far as they know.  You’ve gotta be Nurse Brady here, not Dr. Johnson.”  She hrmphed and crossed her arms.  “I know it’s hard, but look at it like a vacation.  Someone else gets to do the heavy lifting.”

“Ya know what, I did the heavy lifting then, too, half the time.  Neil and Mike always trusted me to do what needed to be done.  I don’t know who this Windsor guy is.”

“Yeah, well, I’m supposed to be in with ‘Hurts All Over’ till you get there.  You goin’ in there or you want me to babysit while you blow off steam?”

“No, I’m going.” 

“Hey.”  Kayla looked back at him.  “I slipped up, too. Called you my wife.”

She smiled and said, “I am your wife.”

“Damn straight.”

Kayla went in to see what ‘Hurts All Over’ was all about and got a song and dance about the woman’s good for nothing father-in-law who laid around all day.  She vaguely remembered that this was a regular hypochondriac when Dr. Windsor walked in.

“Kayla,” he said.  “What were you doing with that splint I just sent off to University Hospital for an x-ray?”  He looked familiar, and she knew she knew him, but for the life of her she didn’t remember his name.

“Ah … Well, there was quite a backup, and I saw that it was a classic ulnar fracture, so I just figured I’d set it and get him an order for the x-ray.”

“Ok, well, good diagnosis, I concur; but next time remember who the doctor is, ok?”

Kayla’s bit her tongue and looked away.  “Sure,” she clipped.  “Right.  Who should I see next, Dr. Windsor?”

“’Dr. Windsor?’  Aren’t we formal.  Sorry if I offended you, but can we go back to Brad?”

“Brad!  Right.  No problem.”

Steve heard this exchange and mocked “Brad,” in a high pitched voice to the woman sitting in the lobby chair, which made her giggle.

Before they knew it, it was nearly 2pm, and they hadn’t broken for lunch.  Truth be told, they were each having a hell of a good time.  Kayla really loved her work, and Steve enjoyed entertaining the patients, giving them the business, making them laugh, and playing silly songs on his harmonica.  Dr. Windsor wasn’t that thrilled about the harmonica part, but he did appreciate the jovial attitudes the patients ended up with by the time they got through their wait and in to be treated.  He hoped to see the smartass volunteer with the patch in the future. 

When the last patient left in an ambulance with chest pains that the EKG had shown was just this side of a full blown heart attack and the Emergency Center was empty, the doctor announced that he was going to lunch and that he’d be back after his afternoon rounds.

Steve immediately headed for the back exam room where he found Kayla resetting the exam table.  “Hey Nurse Brady, you exhausted yet?”

“Yes!” she said as she crawled onto the table and collapsed there.  “I really am.”  Then she sat up. “But ya know what?  I’m having a great time.  And I think you are, too.”

“I am, baby.  I’m having a hell of a time out there, watching you, helping them, and giving Dr. Brad a hard time.”

“Yeah, well, he was giving it back to you, I think.”

“That he was,” he laughed.  “Good for him.  Nice to have a challenge.”

Kayla raised her arms up above her head and stretched deeply.  Steve watched her breasts raise up as she did so, and her voice saying “tits” sounded in his head.  In no time flat, the look in his eye became hungry.

“Uh … You put that thing away, Steve, we’ve got patients out there.”

“No we don’t, Sweetness.  Place is empty.”

“Really.  Oh.  Hmm.”

“Yeah, we didn’t get any lunch.”

“No, we didn’t.”

“I think it’s time I had my break now.”

“Oh do you?”

Steve sat on the physician’s stool and rolled himself over to her.  He placed his palms on her thighs and rubbed them up and down.  “Yeah, I need to eat something.”

Kayla nervously looked to the curtain opening, hoping there really wasn’t an audience out there.  “Mr. Johnson, what do you think you’re doing?”

“Eating lunch, baby.  Starting with those tits you announced were mine at breakfast this morning.”

He stood up quickly and crushed his lips to hers.  She opened her mouth and her thighs to him immediately.  They kissed hotly and greedily while he fondled her breasts.

Kayla moaned into his kisses, and he quickly released her mouth, pushed up the yellow sweater, and sucked at her breast through her thin bra.  Her nipples were already hard when his mouth found them, and he grunted pleasure that he could make her this way before he’d barely touched her.  Then Steve sat back down, pushed her long skirt up her thighs until he revealed the blue bikini underwear, and leaned down to kiss her inner thigh

Kayla’s eyes went wide.  “Steve … I think—“

Don’t think.  Just let me taste you.  Feel my tongue inside you, baby.  He pulled her underwear down and threw her legs over his shoulders.  She was wet, and he thrilled at knowing he was about to make her come.  He kissed the other thigh much closer to her center. 

Kayla smothered a moan in an effort to stay quiet and whispered, “what if someone comes in?”

“They won’t, baby.  Trust me.  I know.”  Then without another word, Steve parted her labia with his thumbs to reveal her clitoris and gave it a slow, rough lick.

Kayla exhaled silently, trying desperately not to moan.  Steve loved the anxious pleasure he felt in her.  He loved that he was giving it to her.  He licked her again, and Kayla gathered up a fistful of exam table paper.  More wetness appeared at her opening, and he knew he was driving her wild.  She just slightly raised her hips toward his face in encouragement, and in answer he plunged his tongue deep within her wet walls. 

Now Kayla did allow herself a moan as she felt her climax begin to peak.  “I can’t believe we’re doing this in here,” Kayla panted.  “Oh, God, Steve, so good.  You feel so good.”

Steve shoved his tongue into her over and over, then he flicked his tongue hard and fast over her clit.  “Yes!  Yes, oh God,” she whispered, then smacked the table hard with her palm to stop herself from screaming.  One last lick of his velvet tongue sent her climax through her hard as she jerked her body into him and released orgasmic wetness.  Steve continued to lick it up, knowing it would drive her mad.   He plundered and licked and sucked until Kayla begged him to stop. 

“No, baby, I want you to come again.”

“I don-don-don’t think I ca-can.”

“Oh, you can, Sweetness.  You’ve got another one in there.”

He put two fingers inside of her and she began moaning anew.  “You’re right,” she panted, “don’t stop, Steve, don’t stop!”

“I’m not gonna stop, baby, but I am still hungry.  Better feed me some more.”  With that his tongue plundered her again, and she whimpered softly, the risk of someone finding them like this seeming to drive her horniness into an even higher gear.  Steve made “mmm” sounds, and the sight of her husband’s head bobbing between her legs sent her over the edge into another powerful orgasm that sent jolts of intense pleasure through her entire body.  Her eyes were closed with her lips slightly parted.  Steve watched as she enjoyed the ecstasy hum through her. 

Finally, Kayla opened her eyes.  “That was hot, Steve,” she panted.  “That was … I can’t believe you just went down on me in an exam room.”

“Yeah, I’m full now.”

Kayla laughed.  “You are a naughty, naughty man.”

“And if you’re a very good girl, I’ll be naughty tonight, too.”

“Well, then I’m going to be extra good,” she cooed.  Steve pulled her underwear back up for her and straightened her sweater and skirt into a less intimate position.  Then she put her arms around his neck and said, “You are very good to me.”

“You’re easy to be good to, Sweetness.”

“How did you know no one would walk in?”

The sexuality radiating out of Steve’s expression was so strong she could feel it in her afterglow.  “I didn’t.  I just hoped real hard.”  Kayla’s mouth hung agape.  Then she smiled. 

Kayla hopped off the exam table and began resetting it again when the doctor walked back in.  This startled them, and they both stifled horrified laughs that they were thisclose to being caught in a very embarrassing position.

“What’s going on back here?” Dr. Windsor asked with suspicion in his voice.

“Nothing!” they said in unison.  “I was just resetting the exam room, Doctor—Brad.”

“Steve headed out and said, “Yeah, she was just getting done in there, Dr. Brad.”

“I see.  And you had to help her do it?”

Steve wanted to bust out laughing at the joke the doctor didn’t even know he was making.  “Don’t you worry your pretty little face, Dr. Brad, I was just making sure Nurse Brady, here, had everything she needed.”

“Yes, well the room looks all set now, you can let your girlfriend just do her job now.”

“No argument from me, dude, she looks all set for the rest of her day now.”

Kayla had to look away from them, she was laughing so hard that her shoulders were shaking.

“Right, so how about you just man the desk now, m’kay?.”

“M’kay,” Steve mocked.  Dr. Windsor shot him a look.  “What?”  The look of warning on the doctor’s face was intended genuinely, but even he knew that Steve saw it with all bark and no bite. 

A smile spread across the doctor’s face despite the irritating way Steve was goading him.  “Shut up, smartass.  Man the desk.”

“You love me.  You know you do.”

He kind of did, but instead of admitting it, the doctor smiled and said, “Up yours.”  He walked back to the coat rack and hung it up.  “Did you guys get any lunch?”

“I ate,” Steve deadpanned.

“I didn’t eat anything,” Kayla added.

“Yeah, well it’s too late now, ‘cause we’ve got a bloody nose on its way in here.”  Sure enough, the door opened, and ‘Bloody Nose’ became the next resident of the room Steve had just eaten lunch in.  “Steve, go help Kayla with the intake.”

Kayla couldn’t look her husband in the eye, she’d laughed so hard before she nearly peed in her pants and didn’t want to court further disaster by actually looking him in the eye.  Steve started the teenager’s intake form while Kayla did her best to focus on the boy’s bloody nose and not the memory of her husband’s tongue as he stood so close to her. 

Both of them continued to smile, trade banter, treat patients, answer phones, and do regular Emergency Center things.  They were so busy enjoying it all that for a few moments here and there, both of them forgot about the stress of jumping and existed solely in the moments that were right now, right here, in this place, in 1987.

Chapter Text

Find Me
Chapter 41

Kayla was in the kitchen when she heard Steve pad down the spiral staircase of the loft she currently shared with no one as far as the people around them knew.  He looked so good in the loose pajama bottoms he’d brought over from his apartment, the sleep still in his eye as it looked at her groggily.

“Mornin’, Sweetness,” he smiled.  “Welcome to Day Four.”  He yawned deeply, and she watched as her husband’s hand ran over the rippling muscles of his chest.

She pressed the button on the coffee pot and walked over to him.  Steve undid her robe as she leaned up to kiss him sweetly, then he pulled her body to him by the open lapels to lay her head against his tattoo.  She snuggled against him and realized that she was starting to get used to their young bodies.  Not just his, but her own, too.  She realized she wasn’t able to be objective, but she did feel that both she and Steve had aged pretty well in the 23 years since they’d met.  Even so, your 40’s and 50’s were still your 40’s and 50’s, and  neither one of them looked or felt like they did in 1987.  Getting to live in her own body pre-children and feel herself enveloped in his, it did feel like something special, surreal, and scary all at the same time.  Now they’d been on this jump for three days, and here on the morning of their fourth, Kayla laid her head on her husband’s chest, listened to his 30’s heart beating beneath her cheek, and realized that she was used to him this way again.  It made her a little sad. 

Steve felt her mood slip a bit and tilted her head up.  “You ok?” he asked.

Kayla took a deep breath, inhaling his very Steve scent.  “I’m homesick,” she said softly.  She tucked back the long hair that had fallen over his eye and felt the stubble on his cheek he’d allowed to grow there.  “It’s been so long, I’m starting to get used to seeing you like this.”

“Young?”

Kayla shrugged.  “Sort of.  Hard to explain.  Just feeling bittersweet, I guess.”  Neither one mentioned Joe or Stephanie. They didn’t have to.  The moment passed, and they allowed their moods to lighten again. 

It had been their best jump so far.  Yesterday had been spent the exact same way as the day before it, at the Emergency Center where Kayla was on the roster as the nurse practitioner on duty, and Steve managed intake and the front desk.  They’d gone back to Steve’s apartment to pick up clothes after that first brave day out in the world, then spent the night at the loft with takeout from Shenanigans.  They made love in front of the fireplace, then went up to sleep in their bed.  It was such a wonderful feeling, being in this bed with each other again.  Both of them just looked at each other and took in what they saw.  It was hard to describe how they felt laying in that bed together, but like a lucid dream, they were aware of the profundity of it all. 

Yesterday upon waking up to find themselves still there, they figured if it’s not broke, don’t fix it, so it was off to another day at the Emergency Center.  Of course, that meant facing another day of hair and wardrobe in the 1980’s.  While she refused to relent on the clothing, choosing a wide-knit pink sweater and a light wash of jeans (ugh, with pleats, why do all my pants have to have pleats?), she decided to give in with her hair and put into a French braid. It had been years and years since she’d done so, especially with her short hair, but she gave up, admitted that she loved her hair that way, and did it. 

When Kayla had emerged from the bedroom, Steve’s breath caught in his throat.  “Have you stepped out of a photo album, Sweetness?”

“Yep.  I think it’s the same one you have,” she said, looking at him standing by the kitchen counter in his white t-shirt and black leather jacket.

Like the previous day, Kayla’s mood was light and happy the entire time they were at the Emergency Center.  She couldn’t believe it, but she actually remembered two of the people that came in this day, and she found so much joy in treating them, knowing that what she was doing was making a difference in their lives.  Steve saw the happiness in her eyes and was relieved that they were finally getting a break.  It’s not like he was lacking in fun, either.  He played his harmonica for the patients, traded insults with Dr. Brad, managed a delivery from the hospital, and snuck several kisses and gropes with his wife when they thought no one was looking.   It was only when Dr. Brad yelled “get a damned room,” that they realized they were not as sneaky as they thought they were and put a lid on it for the rest of the day.  Kayla blushed when she next had to face the doctor, but he was nice and didn’t rib her about it.  He did, however, stick it to Steve the next chance he got. 

“Think you can keep it in your pants long enough to tell me who’s next on the agenda, Johnson?”

Steve smirked.  “You’re just jealous that I don’t have enough of me to save for you, Dr. Brad.”

“Riiight, right,” he came back, “not just your girlfriend, there, but the wife back at the mansion.”

“That’s right, her, too.”

“Your fly’s down, loverboy.”  Steve’s hands flew to his crotch.  Not only was his fly appropriately zipped, but  Brad was now grinning like a fool.  “Oops,” he mocked in the very tone that Steve had used to do the same thing to him, “my mistake.”  Steve put his hands on his hips and smirked at him.  “So, if you wouldn’t mind telling me who’s next on the agenda, I’ll be on my way so you can not so cleverly sneak off to grope your girlfriend some more.”

Steve continued smirking and handed him the chart of the same hypochondriac that Kayla had to deal with the day before and watched him run off to Room 3.  “Have fun, Dr. Brad,” he muttered under his breath.

The rest of that day was much of the same.  It felt so good, finally jumping somewhere that they could just live and not run, dodge, cry, or evade. 

Well … they did evade slightly.  While they didn’t hide, they did avoid obvious opportunities to run into people.  Steve wanted to see his sister but didn’t know how to go about the fact that she hadn’t revealed herself to him in this time yet.  He didn’t know if he was up to the acting job, considered just cutting to the chase and telling her, because, really, what was the difference, but ultimately decided to just wait it out.

Kayla, on other hand, desperately wanted to see her pop, and he knew it.  “Baby,” he’d asked her last night after they’d eaten a dinner that Steve cooked for them just like they were back home, “if we wake up here tomorrow, I think we should go to the pub—the fish market.  See your pop.”

“I … I don’t know, Steve.”

He knew she was afraid, so he treaded lightly; he really wanted to convince her to go.  “Don’t you wanna see him, baby?”

“Yes,” her eyes started to water.  “I just don’t know if I can handle it.”

Steve reached across the table and took her hand.  “You can handle it, Sweetness.  You can handle anything.”

“But what if I can’t leave?  What if I can’t let him go?”

Steve decided not to push.  “You think on it some more.  Let’s see if we’re here tomorrow first.” 

Now tomorrow was upon them while they stood in the kitchen, coffee percolating, ready for a brand new day.  This was the last day Kayla was on the schedule at the Emergency Center for the week, and she had to be there in an hour.  Just as they were about to head up to shower and dress, a knock came at the door.  They looked at each other and resigned themselves to opening it and dealing with whomever it was.

“I miss cell phones,” Kayla said.

“If we’re here in a month we’re buying stock in Motorola, baby.” 

Whomever it was knocked again, and Steve joked, “my money’s on Adrienne.”  Actually, he hoped it was.

Kayla slid open the door and was delighted to see her brother.  “Bo!” Kayla squealed.  “Get in here!” she said as she hugged him.

“Hey, sis,” he said with a wary look on his face as he saw Steve standing there in pajama bottoms and nothing else.  “That’s some hello.”

Kayla tried to rein in her excitement as she watched her brother eye his best friend up and down.  “I’m just happy to see my baby brother, is that ok?”  She dragged him to the couch and sat facing him, grinning from ear to ear.

“Yeah, sure, sis.  So,” he quickly got to the point,” Ma called me last night.  Said Chris came by the fish market to have a talk with her.”

“Oh?”  She looked up at Steve, who was leaning against the counter with a silly grin on his face just waiting for Bo to acknowledge him. 

“Yeah, said that you and Steve were,” he paused as he looked uncomfortably at Steve with more than a little disgust in his eyes, “together.  That you spent the night at his place.”

“Aw, don’t be like that, Bo, it was good enough for you and Hope, now, wasn’t it?”

“You shut up, Steve, am I talkin’ to you?”

“You love me, Beauregard, you know you do.”

“Shut the fuck up, man.”

“Bo!” Kayla interjected, “stop it.  I’m with Steve.  I love him.  He loves me.”

“Aw, Kayla …”

“One day you and he are going to be best friends again, so put a sock in it ok?  I’m way too old for this conversation.”

Bo’s mouth hung open.  “You love each other?  This is a little sudden, don’t you think?”

“No, actually,” Kayla said sticking out her chin, “not to us.” 

“You don’t understand, Kay, this guy is – he’s – there are things you don’t know.”  The tone in her brother’s voice wasn’t the least bit convincing, and she could see that even he wasn’t so sure his heart was in this discussion.

“Baby, didn’t he and I already kiss and make up by now?  I thought we did.” Bo turned and shot him a look.

“There’s very little I don’t know, Bo,” she said as she shrugged at Steve and mouthed I don’t remember.  “Trust me.”

Bo looked at the two of them and got a very weird feeling that he was at an enormous disadvantage.  He didn’t have a clue why, but something was just plain off, and he was the one who felt like he didn’t belong. 

“Is there something going on here?  What are you two talking about?”

“Nothing,” Kayla said, “we’re just happy to see you.” 

Bo softened a bit.  “We?”

“Yeah,” Steve replied.  “We.”

“Ok, look,” Bo said as he stood up and headed for the door, “I’ve gotta get back to Hope.”  This was not what he was expecting.  He was expecting a big confrontation, but now that he wasn’t getting one, the whole thing seemed kind of pointless.

“Wait … it’s 1987 …,” Kayla said.

“Yeah …,” Bo said feeling things get even weirder with her statement of the obvious.

“Shawn-D,” she whispered to Steve.  “Is he born yet? I’d love to see him.”

“Kayla,” Steve warned, “Shh.”

“Kay, what the hell are you talking about?”

She closed her eyes and knew this just wasn’t the time.  She wasn’t even sure the baby was born yet, and asking was going to make her look nuts.  “Ah … nothing.  Sorry, I’m not myself.”

“Finally, something that makes sense,” Bo muttered. 

“Sorry, just – tell Mama I’m fine, ok?”  Then she hugged him and kissed his cheek.

“Tell her yourself, sis, I just came over to – I don’t really know why I came over, you … it’s fine.”

“It is?”

“Yeah, Hope’s been nagging me that you two were made for each other for months.  Told me to come over and see for myself.”  He looked at Steve who went back to grinning, but this one wasn’t smarmy, it was warm and seemed … genuine.  “So, whatever.”  Then he looked at Steve and said, “Don’t be a jerk.”

Steve then put his hands on Bo’s shoulders and pulled him into a hug. 

“Get off me, man!  And put a shirt on!”

Steve laughed heavily and heartily and Kayla looked on with amusement as Bo backed out of the loft and smiled despite himself. 

As soon as he left, Steve looked at Kayla and said, “Kosichek has a big mouth.”

Kayla stood up and licked her bottom lip.  “Isn’t that what you wanted?  For everyone to know?”

“Well, I didn’t know he was gonna go and tattle to your parents.”

“I don’t care who he goes and tattles to.  I would have given anything to be with you back then.”

Steve cupped her face in his hand.  “I would have, too, baby.  We kind of were, weren’t we?” 

“On and off.  You kept backing away.”

He pulled her into a warm embrace.  “Yeah, I did.  Idiot.”

“No,” she looked up at him.  “Scared.  You were scared of hurting me, of being hurt.”

“You were the first love I ever got that didn’t hurt, Sweetness.  I wouldn’t have had any family if it wasn’t for you.  I never would have let my sister in if you hadn’t pushed so hard to make me see that family was worth having.”

Kayla held him tighter, and Steve suddenly felt the same wave of homesickness that Kayla had felt earlier.  He wanted to go home.  He was home, standing in the kitchen of the loft with her, this felt so much like home, but it wasn’t his time.  And he fiercely missed his kids. 

At 9am, Steve and Kayla entered the Emergency Center to find Dr. Curtis setting up for the day, “Well, Kayla!” the silver-haired doctor she hadn’t seen in 20 years greeted her, “looks like we’re a team today.”

“Neil!” she said taken a bit by surprise.  It felt so good to see him.  Almost like a comfort.  She’d always trusted him and knew that he was an ally not only to her but to Steve, as well. 

“I see you brought backup with you, hello, Steve.”

“Hey, doc,” Steve smiled.

“I hear from a mutual acquaintance that you’ve become quite the volunteer around here.”

Steve was a bit nervous. He cared what Dr. Curtis thought about him.  Even back when he didn’t care what anyone thought, he was different for some reason.  He did some quick thinking to be sure he didn’t say the wrong thing.  This was before the senator’s shooting and all that Jencon stuff … and his mother wasn’t here yet, either.

“Yeah, I try to keep it interesting around here.  Don’t let that Dr. Brad convince you otherwise.”

“Dr. Brad?” Neil laughed.  “I like that, I think I’ll tell him to keep that.  No, he spoke very highly of you, actually.  Says you know your way around difficult people.”

“Oh, did he now?” Kayla grinned.  “Hmm, imagine that.”

“So,” Neil said, “Are you going to stick around today, too?  Or do I have to find another volunteer?”

Just then the door opened and Adrienne walked in.  She froze when she saw Steve standing there.  She’d hoped he hadn’t gone back to hating her in the last three days since he’d started being nice to her back at Kayla’s place and tentatively said hello.

“Well now,” Neil said, “It looks like we’ve got a run on the bank of volunteers!  Well, I’ll let you two figure it out, I’ll go get things ready in back.  Kayla, why don’t you join me.”

“Join you?  Ah …,” she looked to Steve for direction. Did he want to be left alone with Adrienne or did he need her to stay.”

“Yeah, come on back.”

“Yeah,” Steve said, “you go on and help Dr. Curtis.  I think we can handle things out here.”

“We can?” Adrienne asked hopefully.

Steve’s heart filled with love for his sister as he watched her try to keep the adoration from her eyes.  “Sure, baby.  We’ll be just fine.”

“Great!  That’s great!” she barely contained her enthusiasm.

“Ok,” Kayla smiled at her husband.  She turned to look in the direction Neil had just gone and gave Steve a quick peck on the cheek.  “Love you,” she whispered. 

Steve squeezed her hand and watched her go to join Neil.  When he looked at Adrienne, she was staring at him.  He didn’t know what to say to her. 

“I didn’t know you’d be here / “How are you doin’?” Adrienne and Steve said simultaneously.

“Sorry! / Go ahead,” they tried again.

Steve silently held out a hand to her that she continue, and she said, “No, no, you go!”

My poor sister.  I’m surprised she didn’t get an ulcer from all this.

“How are you doin’, baby?  Things ok?”

“Yeah.  Yeah, they’re great.  They’re great.”

“Where are you livin’ now?  Haven’t seen you at Kayla’s.”

“You’ve been at Kayla’s?”

Steve wasn’t sure where to go with this, but keeping track of what he should and shouldn’t say to his sister was hard enough, so he took the easy route on Kayla.  “Yeah, we’re together.”  He scratched his head and tried to act aloof.

“I’m glad, I’m real glad, Steve.”  The smile on her face was impossible for him to ignore. He didn’t know it at the time, but now he saw what was there in her just beneath the surface.  Desperation to find her brother.  An adoration for him that never waned from the moment she’d laid eyes on him.  And he saw so much of his mother in her.  He wanted so badly to reach out and hug her, tell her it was all going to be ok and that he was there now.  Why can’t I? he asked himself.  Why can’t I help her now, why do I have to wait for Duke to come to town and do the unspeakable things that he did to her?  An image of Jack rushed into his head, and he shook it to clear out the negative thought as quickly as it had come.

“Steve, are you ok?”

Steve nodded, then struggled to find something innocuous to talk about.  “Yeah, fine,” he answered mildly.  “What, uh, so what are you doin’ down here?”

“Well, I haven’t been feeling well the last couple of days, so I didn’t come in.  I’m feeling better now, though and really wanted to get out of the apartment for a while.”

“Oh right, you were robbed.  You run into any more problems with people breaking into your place?”

“No.  No, I just need to get my phone turned back on and it’ll be fine.”

“Turned back on? Why’s it off?”

“Well, uh, the um … the …,” she stammered, “the bill was kind of high this month and all.  I don’t really need a phone.”

Dammit.   

“You need a phone, Adrienne.  Everyone needs a phone.”

“Well, I just need a job, then I’ll be able to pay the bill.”

“So then how are you paying your rent?”

“What’s with the third degree, huh?” she balked. 

He could tell he was spooking her, so he backed off.  “I just meant this place isn’t exactly paying you.”

“I’m cramping your style again, I get it.  I don’t wanna invade your territory, you can have the volunteer job, it’s ok.”

“No, baby, that’s not …”  Adrienne turned on her heel to go out, but Steve stopped her as a junkie clearly needing some methodone walked in.  “You – there,” he gestured to the chair right next to the desk; he was all business with the heroin addict, “I’ll be with you in a minute, don’t you get up from that spot.”  Then he turned back to Adrienne.  “Look, there’s no one living at my place right now.  Rent’s all paid up, it’s only the beginning of February, you’ve got all month.  I’m living with Kayla right now.  Why don’t you stay there.”

Adrienne glared at him.  “What?”

“My place, just stay there, and there’s a phone so your ma—so you can get phone calls.”

Adrienne’s top lip was a firm line of distrust.  “Why?  Why you wanna do that for me, huh?  You don’t even like me.”

“Baby, I like you fine.”

“You’re lying!  Why can’t you just give me a chance, you don’t even know me!”

“I think that’s what I’m doin’, baby, giving you a chance.”

“Why?” she asked again.

Steve didn’t remember it until just now, but his mother came to town right around Valentine’s Day.  She was going to need a place to stay, too.  Where Duke won’t find them this time. 

Because someone needs to give you a break.  The place is sittin’ there paid for.  You gu—you find a job that pays you real money by the end of the month, and we’ll talk.”

Adrienne’s eyes began to shine with tears.  “Really?”

“Yeah, really.”

She threw herself at her brother and hugged him.  Steve felt her bury her face in his shoulder, and he hugged her back.  “Thank you, Steve!” she cried.  “Thank you!  You won’t regret it!  I’ll take care of it!  I’ll even clean it up for you!”

“You know it’s just one room, right?”

“I’m a good cleaner, I’ll make it shine!”

“Ok, baby, ok.”  She hugged him again, because he didn’t push her away the first time, and she cried more happy tears.  “Shh, come on now.  Come on,” he coaxed.

Adrienne pulled herself away, wiped her face with the palms of her hands, smiled at Steve one more time, then fled to move herself into her brother’s apartment.

Steve watched through the window and smiled as she hurried away.  Then he remembered the addict sitting in the corner, who’d stopped bouncing with withdrawal long enough to fix him with a curious stare.  “Family reunion?” he asked.

“Something like that,” he laughed.

The rest of the day went on much like the two before it.  Kayla was in her element.  She caught up with Neil, which for her was years but as far as he knew was just the previous weekend.  He told her all about Noelle’s latest milestones and shared a bit of Liz’s difficulty in coping with her brother, Tod’s, death.  Kayla didn’t really remember much about that and had to pull some of this from her memory; she was relieved when he mentioned Noelle by name, because she’d forgotten the little girl’s name long ago.  What really struck her was the easy and non-judgmental manner he used in asking how it was going with Steve.  He didn’t question her, he didn’t give her any fatherly advice, he just turned a kind eye on her and said it was nice to see her so happy.  She so enjoyed the social interaction with the man who was such a good friend to her once that she almost forgot that this wasn’t really her time.

Steve continued to charm every single person who walked through the door.  He managed the intake, counseled a stream of callers with first aid needs, and restocked the center with the supplies that had been delivered the day before.  Dr. Brad even called once to set his schedule for the following week, and Steve enjoyed a friendly tousle with him, trying to get the biggest rise out of him he could. 

“Dr. Brad, you’re gonna want to make sure our schedules overlap now, because my dance card is beginning to fill up.”

“Spare me, Johnson, I’m surprised you have time to man the desk at all with all that time you spend playing doctor.”

“See, I knew you were jealous.

Interestingly, the fear of jumping never crossed either of their minds. They both had kept themselves so busy with the everyday routine of these destination bodies – slightly modified by the actions of their current awarenesses – that they really did forget that they might jump at any time.  It wasn’t until they closed up and Neil booted them out the door after their last long day of the week that they realized they were at the end of Day 4 of this jump.  They hadn’t really planned this far ahead and weren’t sure what to do now.  Especially since he’d just, basically, sublet his apartment.

“You had a good day, today, Sweetness. I could see it in your face every time you snuck out to see me.”  The short walk to the bluesmobile was cold, and they could see the fog starting to roll in off the riverfront. 

“I didn’t sneak out to see you!” she denied with a playful push, her voice showing in gauzy, white breaths against the frigid air.

“Get over here, woman.”  He brought her hand back to the crook of his arm, and he kissed her temple. 

“I did have a good day. It was wonderful.  I loved this job.  And seeing Neil was wonderful, too.”  Steve had already told her how it went with his sister earlier in the day.  Now in the beautiful dark of the riverfront, she saw the peace still on his face and knew his decision about how to interact with Adrienne was the right one.   “So, what do you want to do tonight?” she asked.

They’d just arrived at the car.  He backed her up against it and rubbed up against her as he found the spot on her neck that would get him the sweet little whimper he was looking for.  She delivered and he smiled.

“What else do you want to do, Mr. Johnson?”

“What, that’s not enough?”

Kayla reached down and stroked him through his jeans.  Steve’s eye went wide, and he looked back and forth thinking for sure someone must have seen this display. 

“Oh, it’s more than enough,” she said.  But we’ve been here for four days, maybe we should go do something.”

“You’re a bad girl, Kayla.”  He grabbed her hand and held it.  “Weren’t you the one who didn’t want to run into anyone?”

“I still don’t,” she said.  “But it’s been four days, so I’m trying.”

“That’s my girl, Sweetness,” kissing her lightly on the lips.  “You know what I wanna do, baby?  I wanna shoot some pool.  Let’s go to the Heart.”

“Really?  You want to hustle a game of pool?”

“I don’t need to hustle it, I just wanna play.  Come on, baby.  Remember that game with the kisses?  I think you still owe me a few.”

“That’s right!  I’d forgotten all about that.  I think you cheated.”

“You complaining?”

“Nope.”

They left the car where it was and headed down the Riverfront to the Cheatin’ Heart.  They held hands, enjoyed the cold air, and took in the storefronts that neither of them had seen in decades. 

“The whole place is so different now,” Kayla said wistfully.  Steve got more excited with each footstep closer to the dive bar that he’d once felt so at home in.  As soon as the fish market came into view, however, Kayla, began doing the opposite.  He could feel her entire body tense up.  He watched her look over toward the home she grew up in and knew exactly what was going on. 

Steve stopped and brought her fingers up to his lips.  “You wanna go see your pop,” he said to her.

Kayla nodded as tears pooled in the rims of her eyes.  “Yeah, I do.”

Steve smiled.  “Then go see your pop.”  He could see she was relenting.

“Can we do that first?”

“No, this is something you should do on your own.”

“Without you?” she said standing up straighter.

“I’ll be waiting at the Heart for you.”

“No!  No, what if we jump?”  It was the first time they’d mentioned it in at least two days.  “That’s more than just the Emergency Center, Steve, that’s two whole different locations.  I don’t want to do that.”

“Kayla, I’ll be right there at the Heart waiting for you. In fact, I’ll come get you.  I can say I came to see Max or something.  Wait – Kosichek already told ‘em, so I don’t even need an excuse.”

Kayla tried not to panic.  “No, I’m scared, Steve. I don’t want to separate.  Aren’t you scared?”

“Yeah, I am, baby.  But we haven’t jumped yet.”  He paused and was relieved when he saw Kayla thinking it through rather than immediately fight him on it.  “And we don’t know when that’s gonna be.” 

“I miss him,” she said softly.  He held her face in his hands and kissed the tears away that were gently rolling down her cheeks. 

“You need alone time with your pop.  They don’t know we’re married, they don’t know they love me yet.”

“They do, ya know.”

Steve chuckled.  “They will.  Not today.  Today they sort of accept me ‘cause of Max and Frankie.  I don’t want to take a minute away from you, baby.  Not a minute wasted on them wondering what the hell you’re doing with a guy like me.  They don’t know me, yet.  This is a gift, Kayla.  Take it.”

Kayla was torn, but the truth was that with every passing moment, she was more and more desperate to see her father.  The honorable man that gave so much of himself to his children every day that in the end he gave up his own life so that they could live.  “You – you’ll be right there?  At the bar?”

“Right there waiting for you.  In fact, why don’t I come get you.  Text me when you’re ready.”  Kayla laughed through her tears.  “Scratch that,” he laughed with her.  I’m gonna hustle a few rounds for rent money for Adrienne and mama.  Have some chili.  You have your mama’s chowder. I’ll come get you at 9 o’clock.”

“That long?  That’s more than three hours.”

“We can do this, Kayla.  We have to be able to do this.”

Kayla nodded and smiled at him.  “I love you so much.”  He kissed her, and she licked her lips, enjoying the taste of him.  “You can’t know how much.”

“I love you more,” he started their familiar banter.

“Oh, I doubt that,” she cried.

“Come on, I’m gonna walk you over.”

“But The Cheatin’ Heart is right there.”

“I said I’m gonna walk you over,” he repeated leaving no room for discussion.

he left her at the door he nodded and said, “9 o’clock.”

“Love you.”

“Love you, too.  Don’t leave without me,” Steve winked.

“I’ll try.”  She wiped her face, straightened up, turned the handle, and disappeared inside.

Only when she was gone did Steve finally let his face twist into the worry and fear he truly felt.  “We’re really doin’t this,” he said to himself.  “Now go play pool, you idiot.”  He stood there for ten full minutes before he finally forced his legs to walk away and head to the dive bar, unsure of whether or not they’d make it to 9 o’clock before a new jump took them.

Chapter Text

Find Me
Chapter 42

The minute she walked into the fish market the nostalgia hit.  It wasn’t a pang so much as an assault.  She grew up with the smell of fish all the time and became desensitized to it by the time she’d learned to talk.  Now, the sense memory hit her with the force of a physical blow.  The smell of the fish, the color of the walls, the hanging netting, the tablecloths, the cash register … and her father standing right there behind the counter.  Tall, lean, clear-eyed, and every bit her proud, Irish father. 

“Kayla!  Good to see ya, lasse, what have we done t’earn the honor of your presence here, now.”

Kayla was too stunned to talk.  All she could do was stare in wonder.  It was almost the same feeling she got when she saw Steve in the cemetery after all those years.  Only now she knew this might be her one shot.  When the people we love die, and we say I’d give anything to have just one more minute, this was her one more minute, and she knew it.

“Lasse?”

She forced the shaky voice from her within her to form the words.  “Hey, Pop.” 

“Well, hey, yerself, girl.”  Shawn had a cagey look in his eye.  What was going on here?  Something was off.  “You’re mama’s upstairs helpin’ young Max with his homework.  You, eh, wanna go on up?”

Kayla shook her head.  She walked up to the counter and stared into his fierce blue eyes.

“Well, ya should.  Yer ma’s hoppin’ mad ya know.  Missin’ the trial and all.”

Kayla froze.  “The trial?”

“Would do us good to have ya stick around tonight, have some supper.  Smooth things over.”

Kayla nodded.  “Ok,” she said.  “I’d love to stay for dinner.”  What trial?

“Ye mind tellin’ me why ye didn’t go see Kimmie at her trial?”

“Kim’s trial!  Kim is on trial.  Oh Pop, I forgot—I mean I-I-I’ve been working at the Emergency Center.  I’m sorry, no one told me.  I just saw Bo this morning, why didn’t he mention it?”

Shawn frowned at his daughter.  Something was wrong.  “Ya don’t remember your own sister’s murder trial?”  He spoke the words rather harshly, and Kayla was suddenly stricken.  This was not how it was supposed to go at all.  Shawn caught the lost look in her eyes and dropped the discussion about Kim then and there.  “Ya look like ya seen a ghost, girl.  What’s wrong?  Out with it, now.”

That was it for that.  The tears she’d used all her strength not to cry now sprung to her eyes, which immediately became glassy and bloodshot; and Shawn Brady knew without a doubt that something was very wrong with his daughter.  Roman was the serious one.  Kimberly was the one who walked around with storm clouds she pretended weren’t there.  Bo was his brooding troublemaker even before this whole Kiriakis mess.  But Kayla?  Kayla was the one you could depend on as the normal one.  She was the who found the good in every situation, the one who never stopped smiling.  She was his sunny day.  Not this time.

“Kayla, what is it, darlin’?” he gasped.  Her lip quivered as the tears silently streamed down her face.  Shawn reached out to her.  He held her by the shoulders and squeezed, bending his head to search her eyes for whatever could have upset his little girl this much.  “What’s wrong with ye?  Tell me!”

“Pop!” she sobbed.  “I miss you!”  She collapsed against his chest and let her father hold her tightly in his arms while she cried.  Deep, wracking sobs that would not stop once they started.  Sobs that disappeared into the flannel of his shirt as she felt his familiar arms around her.  She wasn’t a 25-year-old woman.  She wasn’t a 45-year-old woman.  She was her daddy’s little girl that was getting her one more minute.

Shawn didn’t say anything, just held her and let her cry as he stroked her blonde head.  He hummed an Irish tune he’d always used to calm down his weepy babies, only it had the opposite effect and made her cry that much harder at the bitter within the sweet.  Kayla held on tight until her cries turned to muffled whimpers and finally soft hiccups.  She hadn’t cried like this since Steve died.  Not even at Pop’s funeral was her grief this profound.  But now, seeing him again – her real father, living and breathing right in front of her – her emotions ran away with her.  It was out of her control, she had to just follow them and hope for the best when they decided they were spent.

Shawn pulled his daughter back from him and said, “If yer done usin’ my shirt as a handkerchief, then I think ye’d better tell me what’s gotten into ya.”  Kayla laughed through the last of her tears.  “Kayla, what’s wrong?”

“Would you believe me if I told you I’m just so happy to see you?” she asked as he sat her down at the far table.

“No, I wouldn’t,” he said firmly.  “Now, look, the place is all closed up, you ma’s upstairs with the kids, Frankie’s got somethin’ on his mind he thinks we’re not noticin’, and now that ya missed the trial, yer ma was even more fit to be tied after talkin’ to Chris about ya the other day.  Now, Kayla, it’s just you and me sittin’ here.”  He looked at her expectantly, but before she could reply he added, “It’s that Patch guy, isn’t it?  He did somethin’ to ya.”

“His name is Steve, Pop, and no,” she smiled, “Steve didn’t do anything.”

“Well, it’s like I said, Chris came over here and told us, ye know,” he continued as if she hadn’t said anything.  “We know he’s been – stayin’ with ye.”  His eyes started to light with Irish temper.  “Are ye in trouble, Lasse?” he asked more softly.  “Is that it?”

“In trouble?”  Kayla had to stifle a laugh.  “No, Pop, no, it has nothing to do with Steve.  Yes, you’re right, we’re seeing each other … he loves me, Pop—“

“Och,” he sputtered as he folded his arms in defiance.

“And I love him.  But it has nothing to do with him.”

He looked at her clearly expecting an answer.  “What then, girl?  Spit it out.”

Kayla just gazed at him with her chin in her palm.  He wasn’t going to understand that they were leaping through time and that she’d forgotten that this was when her sister’s trial was and that he was actually dead so she was overwhelmed with love for him. So, instead she chose the next best thing.  She lied.

“It’s been a very rough few weeks, Pop.”

“Ah, the Emergency Center.”

She neither nodded nor shook her head, merely continued.  “People torn from their families, children left behind, poisonings, difficult people making things very hard.  I’m supposed to now remember every little thing without a clue for how long, and it all just got completely overwhelming.  Part of me is scared all the time, Pop, and if it weren’t for Steve I would have gone insane by now.  Thanks to him, I didn’t give up.  He helped me get through these three weeks.  I don’t know, it might be more, I’ve lost track.  I’d say he pretty much saved my life.  Thanks to him these last three days have finally been pretty good.”

“So good he made ye forget about yer sister?  Chris said ya didn’t even ask about Kimmie’s case when he saw ya at Shenanigans.”

She didn’t know what to say that would make him understand.  “Pop, I’m sorry.  It’s just that it’s been the very worst time of my entire life.  Almost – I can only think of one thing that I’ve gone through that’s been worse than these three weeks have been.  And when I saw you just now, I … I felt like I was home after a long time away.  It all just hit me, and I guess I fell apart a little bit.”

It was as close to the truth as any lie she could have told.

Shawn glared at her and searched for any signs that this Johnson character might have hurt her, but other than the swollen eyes she looked perfectly healthy.  “Ya wouldn’t be feedin’ me a load of malarkey, now, woudja?”

“Pop, no, really.” 

“Alright, lasse,” he gave up.  “You’re sure that Johnson didn’t do anything to ye?”

“Ya know, what, Pop?  One day you’re gonna love him.  He’s an amazing man.”

Shawn finally accepted that whatever was bothering her wasn’t Steve and maybe was exactly what she’d said.  “Ok, ye had a good cry, then, so now how ‘bout ye go face yer mom and then have a good supper.”

Kayla smiled and followed her father up the stairs to the home she’d grown up in her entire life until she’d gone to live in Cleveland.  Her mother was surprised to see her and more surprised to see the telltale signs that she’d been crying.  She was about to lay into Kayla, but Shawn quietly shook his head.  So, she didn’t push her daughter to explain.  Kayla played Candyland with Max, thrilled to see the little brother she didn’t grow up with but loved just the same.  She was taken a bit by surprise when Max gave her the silent treatment but quickly remembered that he started out not talking all those years ago.  Frankie was another story.  Still distrustful, not yet quite willing to relax and accept the Bradys as his family yet.  He seemed more on edge than usual.  It was strange, she didn’t remember this Frankie very well, as he’d spent more time with Steve, actually, though Max warmed her heart immediately. 

They ate a big family meal, and Kayla enjoyed cleaning up the dishes with her mother after.  Caroline had asked her as calmly as she could where she was and why she hadn’t gone to the trial, and Kayla told her the same thing she’d told her father.  Then it occurred to her that not one of her family members had called her checked on her or took the initiative with her.  It was, apparently, Kayla’s responsibility to check in, benefit of the doubt notwithstanding.  So, she chanced “It’s not like I disappeared, though.  I was at work like I always am.  Someone could have called.” Caroline balked slightly but didn’t pursue it.  She never did like confrontation.  Ultimately, Kayla was able to finish the dishes quickly, give her mother enough reason not to doubt her, and came away with a new issue for tomorrow.  What do I start doing about this trial?

Caroline disappeared to put her young son to bed, and Kayla took a really good look around.  It struck her just how similar the place was 20 years later.  The furniture had changed, but most of the wedding photos that were on the mantle would still be there when 2009 came around.  Even John and Marlena’s when they thought he was Roman.  They used the same every day dishes in 2009 as they had used tonight, and while a small flat screen TV was now in the corner, most of the rest of the house was more or less the same.  Perhaps a bit more cluttered with photos of grandchildren and great-grandchildren.  Jeez, Sami, maybe get your tubes tied, she snarked to herself.

Steve was right.  She needed this.  It was like a salve on an open wound.  It wasn’t that Steve couldn’t ease her pain, it was just that some wounds heal best with different medicines.

It was eight o’clock.  One more hour of her one more minute.  Kayla’s heart felt momentarily heavy anticipating the end to this gift. 

“Hey, Kayla,” Frankie called over to her, momentarily dissipating her tension. “Max wants to say goodnight to you.”

“Well, then I won’t keep him waiting,” she said, heading for what used to be Bo’s old room where the boy was tucked in bed.

“Yeah, too bad Steve’s not here, he wanted to say goodnight to him, too.  Wonder what he’s doin’ tonight.”

“Yeah,” Kayla said with a knowing smile.  “I wonder.”

Steve howled as he sank the eight ball on his fourth straight game.  “Woo hoo, ladies and gentlemen, that’s what I’m talkin’ about!”  One of the regulars that Steve had long forgotten the name of threw his cue stick across the room and swore loudly.  “Dude, dude, dude,” Steve chastised, “you kiss your mama with that mouth?”  The bar erupted with laughter, and the man dug into his jeans pockets in disgust. 

“That’s my last $50, Patch.  I’m tapped out.”  He handed the bills to Steve, but he held up his hand and pointed to his right. 

“Give ‘em to the little lady over there,” he said, to which the brunette little lady in question blushed and said, “Thanks, Patch, you’re a lifesaver, you know.”

“You just get that boy of yours a nice birthday, Joanie.”  She nodded and gave him half the money he’d just hustled.  “Nah, baby, you need that.”

“And you don’t?  You’re not rich, Patch, you need it, too.  Take it, you earned it.”

“No, it’s yours.”

“No, Patch.”  She was insistent, so he relented and took the money.  “What else can I do to thank you?” she asked him.  It was an innocent gesture of appreciation, rather than something salacious. 

At first Steve was going to insist that there was no need for thanks and to just pay her rent and give her son a nice birthday.  But then he did think of something.

“Just one thing, baby.”

“Anything, what is it?”

“You can start calling me Steve.  I don’t go by Patch anymore.”

“Oh,” she turned a deep crimson and felt immediately bad.  “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to – everyone calls you that, I didn’t really – I didn’t know.”

“Don’t get worked up, baby, it’s a recent thing.  Just call me Steve.”

“Ok.  Steve.  Thank you.  You don’t know how much this means to me.”

Steve gave her a hug, and she disappeared out the door with the money he’d hustled for her.  Joanie had run into the Heart just after he’d arrived, crying and saying she was looking for him.  He hadn’t remembered her name, but he absolutely remembered her face and that she was one of those people down on the Riverfront who were barely making ends meet.  She’d asked him if she could borrow some money so she could pay her rent, plus it was her son, Johnny’s, birthday.  Steve helped her without hesitation.  Won all four of the games some hustler tried to hustle him out of.  Sadly, the man was out of his league.  Steve tucked the money away and made a mental note to pay Kosichek for the March rent ahead of time so that his mother and sister had somewhere to stay.

Steve downed his third beer and was feeling a nice, warm buzz settle over him.  Lots of people knew him there and made various manner of small talk.  He didn’t remember a single one of them, but he didn’t find winging it that difficult.  In fact, he was enjoying it very much.  Steve shot some more pool just for the hell of it, ate his chili, and listened with fascination as the blue collar crowd engaged in a rather amusing political discussion.

“The man’s senile, don’t you get it?” one guy slurred.

“Reagan’s not senile, you idiot!  Reagan’s a hero.  A goddamn hero!”

“Your both idiots,” a third piped in, “’cause it doesn’t matter, he’s a lame duck.”

“He’s not a lame duck ‘til af’er the ‘lection,” the first guy replied.  ‘Til then he’s senile again.”

“I think you’re senile.”

Steve clapped his hands and practically rolled with laughter. 

“What the hell are you laughin’ at?  You think something’s funny over here?”

“Who me?” Steve asked with a smooth charm.  “Just this table, my friend.  You seen it?  Not a single shot to be had.  I’m just laughing ‘cause I won’t be losing any money on this one.”

“Yeah?  I think you’re laughing at President Reagan, that’s what I think.  You’re laughing at a hero.”

“Why would I do that?”

“Ya look like a Democrat.  You vote Democrat?”

“I wouldn’t know, I was too busy being a soldier.”

“A soldier?!  Aw, shit, I’m sorry, I didn’t know.”  The man who wasn’t a regular and had no clue that Steve Johnson was playing with him stood up and yelled loudly to the whole bar, “this man’s a vet!  Nam! … You were in Nam, right?” he asked a little too late, as the damage had been done.  “Get the man a beer!”

“Italy, actually.”  Steve couldn’t help himself.

“Italy?  Yeah?”  The man struggled to place the military offensive that would have taken place in Italy.

“Special assignment,” Steve helped him out. Then he tapped his patch for effect. 

“Ooooh, man!  Hey, this is a hero, here!  Lost his eye fighting the Cong in a top secret mission in Italy!”

The two guys originally arguing with him both looked at him like he was nuts.

Steve could barely contain his laughter at the absurdity of the statement – and what’s more, this guy was dead serious. 

“Thank you!  Thank you … uh …”

“Steve.”

“Steve!  Thank you, Steve, for your service to this country!”  He then stood at full attention and saluted until he finally took pity on the guy and saluted back.  The man then went back to his beer.

The bartender knew Steve as a regular and knew damn well that the closest Patch had ever gotten to Viet Nam was on some trawler while in the Merchant Marines.  He caught Steve’s eye, shook his head, and smirked as he poured Steve what would be one last beer.

Now half an hour later, Steve would have been losing every last dollar he’d made earlier if this had been a hustled game, as he was slightly more intoxicated than is recommended for precise billiard shots.  Steve cursed as one shot after the next missed their intended pockets.  “Well, screw this stick, man!  I need mine!  These sticks suck!” Steve called out to the bar.  “My wife gave me the best cue ever made.  Can’t lose with that one.  Back at my apartment.  And my other apartment.  I’ve got two apartments.”

“What the hell you goin’ on about, Patch?” the bartender yelled.

“My name is Steve, dammit!”

“Oh, it’s Steve now?  And you’ve got a wife and two apartments?  Ok, I’m cutting you off.  Time to go home!”

“No, it’s …” he looked at his watch. “… only 8:30, I need to kill another half hour, man!  Gimme a shot of bourbon!  No!  Whiskey!  I want a whiskey!”

“Show me the money, Johnson.”

“No, put it on my tab.”

“What is this, Bennigans?  You ain’t got a tab.”

“Aw, c’mon, dude, even Kosichek gave me a tab!  If I can get one with that asshole, I should be able to get one here.  Why didn’t you ever give me one?”

“Patch, shut up.”

“STEVE!”

“Whatever!”

“If I play you a song can I have my whiskey?”

“If I give you a whiskey, will you leave?”

“That’ll work.”

The bartender poured a shot of whiskey, which Steve tossed back, then true to his nature, rather than his word, he took out his harmonica and started singing a song he made up on the spot, each phrase followed by the familiar punctuation of a standard harmonica blues riff.

“Well, I closed my eyes …”
“In two thousand and nine …”
“With my girl in my arms …”
“In the bed that was mine …”

“But then I woke up …”
“Sometime in the past …”
“My wife had big hair …”
“We got real young real fast, I’m singin’”

“The jumpin’ blues …”
“And me withoooouuuut my pool cue …”
“I got the blues …”
“Real soon we’ll go some … where that’s new! …”

The bartender rolled his eyes and pointed to the door as an amused smile he couldn’t quite help started to spread across his face.  Before Steve headed out the door, the man with American pride came up to Steve, slapped him on the shoulder, and said, “You’re a goddamn fine American.”

Steve opened his eye wide and looked at him.  “Thank you!  I’ll look you up when I get home!  You’ll be about 60!”

“Nighty-night, Johnson,” the bartender encouraged.  “See ya next time.  Have fun sleeping that off, now.”

Steve stumbled out the door, not so inebriated that he couldn’t walk, but intoxicated enough that he wasn’t going to be able to hide it from Kayla. 

Kayla!  Steve sobered just slightly with the realization that he had to go get Kayla at the fish market while he was less than sober.  “Oh, that’s really brilliant, asshole.  Make ‘em just really love ya now.”

Steve got as far as the pier before he decided the best thing to do was not go to the fish market as planned, and instead to sit here and try to look sober before he knocked on the door.  He sat on the bench in the cold air and watched the fog continue to roll in off the river.  He loved the smell of this place.  It held more memories than he could count.  He and Kayla.  He and Bo.  He and Marcus.  Britta died right over there.  “Where the fuck did she come from?” he asked himself out loud.  “You’re just drunk, dude.”  He glanced over to his right and remembered Kayla scraping him off that very spot and taking care of him when there wasn’t anyone else to do it.  He didn’t really know it at the time, but he’d fallen in love with her.  She’d cleaned him up, seen him at his very worst, including under his patch for the first time, and she wasn’t any more horrified than if he’s had two perfectly good eyes.  People who didn’t get any farther than seeing him at a gas station shunned him; yet, this amazing and beautiful woman saw his scarred flesh and continued to pursue him.  He hadn’t understood at the time just how hard he had fallen for Kayla Brady, but that was when things turned for him and he saw her as not only someone he cared about, but as someone who cared about him.  

Steve sat like that for twenty minutes, remembering, chuckling, waiting to sober up. 

At 8:45, Kayla started to pace.  Her father had tried to leave the room several times, and Kayla found reasons to keep him there.  Steve was right, she needed to enjoy every single moment with him.  And so other than a brief trip to the bathroom for both of them and about half an hour spent doing dishes with her mother, she spent those moments with him, laughing, talking about Kimberly and her brothers, and all the things happening with everyone.  Marlena was dead, Roman was struggling with the three kids, and it looked like Kimberly was going to serve time for killing Shane’s first wife.  No one mentioned Bo and Hope and Victor Kiriakis.  Kayla wanted to pipe in and say don’t worry, she’s alive, just wait till the real Roman comes back, and they’re about to get a new grandson.  The one thing she did allow herself was a nudge about Kimberly.  “Pop, you should talk to Shane about that partner of his, that Gillian.”

“Who now?”

“His partner, I think her name is Gillian.”  Honestly, the names had faded over time, so she wasn’t sure, but she figured close enough.  “I don’t really trust her where Kimberly’s concerned.  I think you should talk to Shane, tell him that you want him to look into her, that you don’t trust her.”

“Kayla, do ye know somethin’ we all don’t?”

“I might, Pop.  All I’m saying is that we all know Kimmie didn’t kill Emma, and he should look into this Gillian woman a little more closely than he’s already doing. That’s all.”

“And ye know this how?

“I’m resourceful.  And I have a hunch.”  Shawn eyed her and crossed his arms in front of him.

“Come on, Pop, you always taught me to trust a Brady hunch, right?” 

Shawn looked into the blue eyes of his daughter so much like his own and nodded.  “Ok.  I just hope ye know what yer sayin’.”

Kayla kissed her father on the cheek and laid another intense hug on him, which was enough for Shawn to drop it for the rest of the night. 

Shortly thereafter, Shawn caught her looking at her watch for the 17^th time that evening.  “Ye got a hot date, do ye?”

“No!  Why?”

“Cuz you’re wearin’ a hole in my carpet, girl.”

Kayla looked at her father.  “I just don’t want to go, Pop,” she said softly.  “I … I am going to miss you.”

“Well, then come back and have supper tomorrow, we should have some perch left, they were really bitin’ all this week.”

Kayla felt the sting at the back of her eyes and mentally forced herself not to cry.  “Pop, I want you to know, you were – and are – the best father anyone could ever ask for.  Thank you for being my pop.”  Then she hugged him tightly around the neck and felt him tense up with his own emotion. He hadn’t been expecting the outpouring of sentiment from her and had to get himself together.

“Kayla, lasse, you’re some girl, ye are.  You’re some girl, I got there.  I’m proud of ye.  I couldn’t be prouder.”

Kayla smiled and a tear did roll down her face.  “I love you, Pop.”

Then she got her coat and headed out the door while she still had the willpower to do so.  She stopped in the doorway and turned back to see him.  He waved at her, and for a moment his eyes understood everything.  She saw in his eyes the understanding of who she was, what she was going through, and who she would one day be.  She couldn’t explain it, she didn’t know what it was or that she wasn’t making it up in her head.  But her father’s eyes were speaking something to her. 

“Pop?” she asked softly.  “Tell God thank you for me, please.  Tell him thank you for my one more minute.  Ok,” she squeaked out.”

He returned her gaze with calm and sincerity.  “I surely will, darlin’”

Then Kayla walked out the door and ran away from her parents’ home as fast as she could with fresh tears streaming down her face.  Ran to seek bittersweet comfort in the arms of her husband.

Chapter Text

Find Me
Chapter 43

The sound of Kayla’s footsteps coming down the pier made Steve’s heart race.  The sound of her sniffling made it race a little faster.  He stood up and wobbled just slightly, catching Kayla completely off guard.  She startled at the unexpected sight of him as she barreled across the pier on her way to the Cheatin’ Heart.

“Steve!  What are you doing here?”

“What are you doin’ here, baby?”  Sadness splayed across Kayla’s face as Steve noticed how swollen her red-rimmed eyes were.  “Uh oh.  Uuuuh-ooooh”

“Pop,” she said, trying not to break down again.  Then she shrugged in resignation.  “I saw my pop.” 

Steve ran the back of his hand down Kayla’s cheek, then bent to kiss her forehead, swaying a bit on his way there.  “You’re glad you went, though.”

Kayla instinctively reached her hands up to his arms to steady his bobble and narrowed her eyes.  He looked just a bit off.  “You ok?” she asked.

“Yeah, baby, why wooden’I be?”

She folded her arms in front of her and cocked her head to the side slightly, studying him.  “Have a good time at the Cheatin’ Heart?”

“Yeahp,” he smiled, knowing damn well he wasn’t fooling anybody.

“Shoot some pool?”

“Yeahp,”

“Have six beers?” 

“Only four.”  He held up three fingers.

“Ah,” she nodded with disapproval in her eyes, an amusement she couldn’t help, however, pulling at the corners of her mouth.

“An’ a shot’a whiskey.”

Kayla glared at him, and Steve was struck by the vision before him.  She looked so much like his long ago Kayla.  The curls in her hair, the smoothness of her skin, the youth in her face.  But the look in her eyes, her stance, the way she held her head … they were all his Kayla. The one he came back to in 2006.  The one he continued to love with every fiber of his being in 2009.  Somewhere in his head he figured the alcohol was affecting him, but he just couldn’t tear his eyes away from her as the paradox struck him.  His older, wiser, more lived-in Kayla was living in his younger, less experienced, innocent Kayla.  He saw her there.  He really saw his wife staring at him with those eyes.

“My God, Kayla, I see you.  I really see you, baby.”

“I’m surprised you see anything right now,” she chuckled through her annoyance.

“No, I’m seein’ you, baby.  2009 you.”

“Yeah, ok, you’re drunk.”

“Only a little drunk.”

She reached out for his hand.  “Only a little drunk?”

“I’m still standin’ up.  Been way drunker.” 

Kayla smirked and nodded.  “That’s true.  Though, I think I see why you’re not on your way to the fish market right now.”

“Thought maybe tha’was a bad move.”

“I think we should get you home,” she said grabbing his chin with mock annoyance.

“Baby?  I really see you.  I see you.  My Kayla, Sweetness.”  Steve held her face in both his hands.  “Not just right now.  I know who I’m married to.”

“Steve, I know.  It’s ok, let’s just go home.”

“Home! That is where I wanna go, baby.  Home.  Even though I love seeing you this way.  And I do. Baby, it’s been somethin’ else.  But, it’s like it’s just a costume.” Steve didn’t really slur, but the intoxication made his speech looser, easier.  “You’re right here in fron’a me.”  He palmed her thick curls off her forehead and looked her hotly in the eyes.  “I love it here on this jump.  But I always want you.  You know that dontchu?” 

Kayla actually understood what he was trying to say.  She’d seen so much of her 2009 Steve throughout these jumps.  Sometimes it was harder to find him, but usually she saw him beneath the surface.  He held himself so much differently as a 50-year-old than he did as a 30-year-old.  He was calmer. He liked himself a lot more.  And she felt the same way about him that he did about her.

“I do know that.  I feel the same way.”  She kissed him and tasted the smokiness of the whisky on his lips.   It was soft and gentle, and it was a sweet comfort to Kayla after the time she’d spent with her father.

“I’m sorry I’m drunk,” Steve said when he broke from her lips.

Kayla shrugged.  “Just a little drunk,” she grinned.  “Did you have fun?”

Steve nodded.  “I did,” he said pulling her down to sit on the bench.  “Never did deserve you,”. 

Kayla giggled and enjoyed her husband’s slightly drunk arm holding her tightly around the shoulders.  She laid her head against him and watched the fog roll in as various boats sailed by.

“Thanks for encouraging me to go home.  Seeing my pop was …,” she exhaled heavily.  “… you were right, it was wonderful.”  Steve kissed the top of her head, and she snuggled into his shoulder.  “He was so young.  He stood up so straight.  He smelled so much like my pop.  I broke down.”

“Oh, baby.”

“I did,” her voice caught in her throat.  “He didn’t understand why I was crying so much.  I haven’t cried like that since we thought you died.  It was almost cathartic how hard I cried.”  Steve stroked his thumb over Kayla’s gloved hand and just let her get it out as the alcohol continued to buzz in his head.  “I don’t think I convinced him till the very end that you hadn’t hurt me.”

“Yeahp, there it is.”

“Well, I set him straight. Told him that he was gonna love you one day.  And that you saved my life.”

“Saved your life?”

“The atropine.”

“Ah.  You tole ‘im you were poisoned?”

“Not in so many words.  But if nothing else, he and Mom know that you are a good man, that you’re good for me.”

“What else did you talk about, Sweetness?”

She exhaled.  “Nothing I want to talk about right now.”  He looked at her questioningly.  “Later.  Don’t want to think about it anymore.”  Steve didn’t push.  She didn’t say anything more for a while; they just sat with each other in a comfortable silence, looking out into the river as people walked past them.   They looked very much like a couple in love.  Which is what they were, in this time and in their own.  Eventually, Kayla said, “Max doesn’t talk yet.  I’d forgotten about that.  And Frankie is really angry.”

“Poor kids,” Steve said.  “They’re gonna be alright, though.”

“I played Candyland with Max.  He wanted to say goodnight to you.”

“Aw, man.  We sh’go back, I’d like to see him.”

“No, I don’t think so. Not tonight.”

“Right.  Forgot.  Drunk.”

“It was the first time we were apart since we began jumping, you know.”

“Only for you.  I already left you at Gabrielle’s.”

“Oh yeah.  Well, it was the first time we did it on purpose, I guess.  Did you miss me?”

“I always miss you.”

“Steve.”

“Wha?”

“Come on, now.”

The alcohol loosened up his reluctance to say the words out loud, and so he was honest with her where he wouldn’t have been otherwise.  “I think we both needed time doin’ our own thing, baby.  For just a few hours.  Normal people don’t spend every minute with each other.  We’ve been with each other every minute.”

“So you’re sick of me?” she said only half kidding.

“Kayla, no.  I couldn’t be sick of you.  But we’re getting on each others’ nerves, baby.”

“Oh we are, huh?”

“Shit, I said the wrong thing.”  He ran his hand through his hair and adjusted his patch.  “Don’t be mad.”

“I’m not mad.”  She tilted her head to look at him and then ran her finger down his patch.  “You’re right.  We’re getting a little bit in each others’ hair, I think.”

Steve turned to kiss Kayla’s temple.  “I love your hair this way.” 

Kayla chuckled.  “So, it wasn’t hard for you?  To go to the Cheatin’ Heart without me?”

“I dunno ‘bout that, now.”  Kayla raised an eyebrow.  “I stood outside the fish market for an hour.”

“You stood out there for an hour?!” she sat up straight.

“Get back here,” he pulled her back down to lay against him.  “I might have exaggerated a little, prolly more like ten minutes.  I stood out there a long time, I was afraid to go.” 

Kayla smiled.  “You were?”

“Especially when I heard you crying.”  Kayla tensed.  “I wanted to run in there, but I knew why you were and that you needed this.”  He paused then mustered up the courage to say, “And I needed it, too.  I needed to be able to let you go without me.”  Kayla started feeling the chill and snuggled into Steve.  “You’re jumping first, and you don’t know what I been goin’ through when I see you leave and your body just go blank.  I needed to be able to be on my own.”

She understood.  She really did.  Kayla wiped away a stray tear and felt a momentary flicker of anger at whomever was doing this to them.  Then she relaxed a bit as the moment passed.  Kayla kissed her husband’s cheek and said, “Tell me about your evening.” 

Steve smiled.  “Well, I beat the pants off someone I don’t remember, four times.  Made about two-hundred bucks.”

Kayla sat up straight, her eyes suddenly very alert.  “Really?  Wow.”

“Yeah, gave most of it to Joanie.”

Kayla’s face fell a bit.  “Who?”

“Joanie.  I remembered her right away.  She’s a single mom, good for nothin’ ex.  Came in there actually lookin’ for me.  Can you imagine, Sweetness, the very day I decide to go to the Heart, and someone comes in lookin’ for me.  Asked for my help to pay the rent.”

“Pay the rent?” Kayla repeated.  “Why would you – oh yeah …”  Kayla vaguely remembered now.  “I remember that girl, I am pretty sure.  Really small and frail?  Brown hair, I think.” 

“That’s her.”

Kayla chuckled.  “I remember her, now.  I think that’s the girl I saw you with there, and I thought you had stood me up to have a date with her instead. I was really mad.  But I think Adrienne told me it wasn’t true, and I talked to the girl.  And then I realized what a good heart you had, always helping everyone else.”

“Yeah, I’m a saint, baby.”

“So, history repeats itself, it seems.  Do you have any of it left?”

“Yeah, she gave me half.  Thought I’d pay the rent on my apartment and let Adrienne and Mama live there.”

“Jo’s in Salem now?”

“Think so.  Wait, no.  I dunno.  Can’t think right now.”

Kayla patted her husband’s chest and said, “C’mon, big boy, let’s get you in bed.”

“Thought you’d never ask.”

“Not that kind of bed, honey, come on.”

Kayla stood up and pulled on Steve’s arms, but he yanked her back down so that she was sitting across his lap, and she gave up a little yelp.  “That’s the only kind of bed I want, Sweetness.”  Then he kissed her hard, his tongue prying open her lips to let him in.  Kayla didn’t need much convincing; she opened to him naturally as she always would, tasted the alcohol on his tongue, and felt a tingle in her belly.”

“Mmm,” she moaned into his kiss.  It was hot and wet and went on for several moments without breaking.  But Steve’s kisses were never harsh.  This one was hard and demanding, but she still felt how much he loved her in that kiss.  She also felt how much it was turning her on.

“How can you be so horny with all that beer in your system?”

“Baby, all this beer in my system makes me want you more.”  He slipped his hand inside her coat and firmly rubbed her breast. 

“Steve!” Kayla gasped as she looked to see if anyone saw them.  “There are people around!”

“I need your tits in my mouth, baby.  Need to taste your sweet nipples.”

“Shhh!  What has gotten into you?”

“I wanna get my dick into you, that’s what I want,” he had the wherewithal to whisper as he nibbled on her ear.

“Oh-kaaay,” she said nervously as an older couple passed by them looking very disapprovingly at the public display.  “I really think we should continue this at the loft, Steve.”

He kissed her neck and trailed his lips up her jawline until he met her lips again.  “Gonna do all kinds of naughty things to you in that loft, Sweetness.”

Kayla was trying not to be taken in by the seduction, because one of them had to keep their head.  But his words were lighting her on fire.  She pushed herself away from him, shot up, and backed away. 

“Steven Earl Johnson,” she commanded, trying hard not to smile, though she was failing miserably.  “You stand up and get over here right now.  Steve stood up and felt dizzy.  Kayla saw that he was but forced herself not to go to him.  “Come on.”

“Come on what?  Whatchu want me to come on?”

“Steve, please!”

“I like it when you beg, baby.”  He covered the two few steps between the bench and where she now stood against a pylon and kissed her hard again. 

“Oh,” she relented as she wrapped her arms around him and continued to kiss him.  Finally, she came to her senses.  “Steve, you need to sober up, we shouldn’t do this ‘til your head is clear.”

“Sweetness are you trying not to take advantage of me?”

“Something like that,” she laughed.  “Not that I don’t want you, but it probably isn’t right.”

“Oh, it’s right.  My head is clear.”

“We’re in public,” she whispered loudly.

“Ain’t no one here at the moment, baby,” he persisted.

“Steve!”

Steve turned his head back and forth and then tugged her under the stairs of the pier.  For the most part, they were obscured from view, and Steve’s erection grew harder even amidst the effects of the alcohol.

“How ‘bout now, not very public now.”  He slipped has hand back into her coat and gave her breast a squeeze.

“Not that hidden, either,” she whispered.

Steve looked her square in the eyes and was momentarily very sober.  “You want me to stop?”

Kayla suddenly wanted nothing more than for him to continue, needing to feel him fill her with the ample flesh that she could feel straining against her leg.  “What I want is to scream your name.  Can’t do that here,” she teased.

“Let’s go.  You’d better drive.”

“Ya think?”

Once in the car, Kayla didn’t even get it turned on before Steve was on top of her.  “Best car ever made, Sweetness.  I miss bench seats.”  Kayla moaned as he sucked on her neck.  She could feel that he was about to leave a mark, so she quickly spiraled her head away from him so that she could return the favor.  She unzipped his leather jacket and threw her leg over to straddle him.  “Oh, Mmm …,” Steve groaned.  Kayla devoured his mouth, savoring the feel of his hungry lips devouring hers back.  “Take advantage of me, baby.  I wanna feel your lips on my cock.”

Kayla’s arousal was heightened by his words, and she could feel herself release a gush of wetness.  She pulled back from him and looked him right in the eye.  “You want me to suck you, Steve?” her tongue then darting out to lick her bottom lip. 

“Oh Baby.  Suck me.”

“Say please.”  Steve’s eye narrowed, and the game gave him such pleasure.  “You’re not the only one who likes to be begged,” she cooed.

“Please suck me, Kayla.  Please wrap that hot mouth around me.”

Kayla looked out all the windows, but the parking area had emptied with the lateness of the hour.  Steve reached over to lock the doors as Kayla slipped off of him and unzipped his jeans, releasing his hard penis.  With another glance out the front window, Kayla turned her head back to Steve and wasted no time before lowering her lips to his lap and taking his tight flesh entirely into her mouth.

“Oh … baby … Oh yeah, just like that.  So hot … uhhhh,” he moaned. 

Kayla wrapped her tongue around his stiff shaft, sucking hard at the head while wrapping her hand firmly around the base and stroking in rhythm with that of her tongue.  Steve moaned loudly, chanting her name over and over as he continued to release pearls of cum into her mouth.  Kayla took them, reveling in the familiar taste, knowing she was giving him such deep pleasure.  Steve, meanwhile, wrapped his fingers in her hair and simply let his hands feel the rhythm of her bobbing head.  It was erotic and hot, and he wanted to explode inside of her. 

“Kayla, I’m gonna come.”

“Good,” she said, releasing him to take a quick breath, kissing the very tip of his cock.”

There’s nothing in this moment that he wanted more.  “You s-sure?”

“Come, Steve.  Scream my name, baby.”

She lowered her lips back onto him and used the thumb of her other hand to firmly stroke the area just below his balls as she continued to lick and suck him.  The added sensation sent him over the edge as he took one hand and grabbed the back of the seat while the other pushed on her head as his hips started to thrust; he just couldn’t help himself, she’d worked him into that much of a frenzy.  The sound of Kayla humming a moan around his penis began the first pulses of an orgasm so intense that he practically saw stars.  

“Kayla!” he roared as the cum shot into his wife’s mouth.  He felt her continue to pump up and down over his shaft while stroking beneath his balls, taking everything he gave her.  “Kayla!” his voice broke from the intensity of the sensations.  They were so exquisite and the connection to her so powerful, he didn’t want it to end.  The last of his cum spurted into her mouth, as the effects of the orgasm worked a pleasure through his body that enveloped him and made him dizzy.  He felt high.  He needed more.  But more than that, he needed to hold his wife.

Kayla smiled, feeling immense satisfaction knowing that she just gave her husband mind-blowing pleasure.  She sat up and wiped her mouth just as Steve lifted his head to look at her. 

“Baby,” he rasped with just a touch of something overwhelming.  He reached his left hand up to her face and used his thumb to help her wipe the moisture from the corner of her mouth.   “Come ‘ere, Sweetness.”  He brought her head to rest on him, but it wasn’t enough.  “No, closer, baby.  Let me hold you.”  Kayla snuggled against him as she wrapped her arms around his middle.  Steve kissed her head.  “Thank you.  There’s no man on this earth that loves his wife more than I love mine.”

Kayla sighed.  “I love you more,” she said.

“No, Sweetness.  You don’t.  Kayla was touched.  How did he continue to make her heart melt every single day?  She went to say more, but he shushed her with his fingers.  “Just hold on to me, Kayla.”  So, she did.

Neither could say how long they stayed like that inside the fogged up windows of the Bluesmobile, but eventually they were both chilled enough that they had to move.

“Cold?” Steve prompted.

“Hmm-mm,” she shook her head slowly. 

Steve kissed her cheeks, her forehead, her eyelids.  “I think you are, baby.”

“Ok, maybe a little.”

“You want more?”

Kayla giggled.  “I might.  But not here.”

“Then you’re gonna have to get us going, baby.  ‘Cause if you don’t, then I’ll have no choice than to take you right here.”

Kayla reluctantly started the ignition, turned on the heat, and drove them back to the loft.

“I’m nice and sober now,” Steve said as he looked at her with a leer in the elevator.

“So, I didn’t completely take advantage of you back there, then?”

“You didn’t get a thing out of it, so I’m not the one who got taken advantage of.”

“I got plenty out of it,” she set him straight.  “I got to make you feel so good that you could barely speak.  That’s worth plenty.”  She smiled and reached for his hand.  Steve took the hand she offered and placed it on his crotch.  Kayla’s eyes got big with shock.  “How is that possible?”

“Because I need you, that’s how.”

Kayla’s arousal was all she could feel, and it propelled her to jump into his arms.  He held her easily, the alcohol gone from his head, and pinned her up against the side of the elevator as she wrapped her legs around him.  Their kisses were wild and carnal, and Steve was desperate to stick his fingers inside of her, feel the wetness he knew was there.

After an eternity, the elevator reached their floor, and Steve carried her out with her still wrapped around him.  He shoved her hard against the loft door, and she cried out; not from the force but from the frustration of not being naked yet.  She broke away long enough to fumble with the keys and get them inside the apartment.  Steve dragged the door closed, locked it, then began tearing her clothes off, starting with her coat.  Kayla did the same, and in very sort order they had trailed their clothing one piece at a time across the floor and up the spiral staircase.  He stopped at the bottom to take one pert breast into his mouth and sucked hard.  He ran his tongue around it before flicking it fast and hard over her hard nipple.  Then he nipped it firmly, making her cry out. They were naked, and Kayla snaked a hand down to his cock to stroke it, but Steve had to feel her heat.  He released her then advanced on her, forcing her to move backwards up the stairs, continuing to kiss and fondle her.  They were only about half way up when Steve stopped them, grabbed Kayla firmly around the waist, and finally shoved two fingers into her. 

“Sweetness, you’re so wet for me.  You’re so wet.”

“That’s what hearing you come like that does to me, Steve.  Did you know that?”

He stroked her firmly, and Kayla’s head lolled back as she exhaled in ecstasy. 

“I love you, Sweetness,” he said as the very beginnings of her climax began to warm in the pit of her stomach.  He kissed her hotly, then removed his fingers and licked them.  “You taste sweet, too.”  Kayla gazed at him with her own very drunk eyes.  “Bed,” he commanded, “Right fucking now.”

Kayla backed the rest of the way up the stairs, threw herself onto the bed, and spread her legs while leaning up on her elbows.  “Cock,” she commanded back, “right fucking now.”

Steve almost came right there.  He quickly fell on top of her and impaled her hard with his steel erection.  Kayla cried out and released sexual gasps with his every thrust.  The sounds she made drove him wild as he worked into her with a steady rhythm.  Soon, the orgasm cresting within her was all she felt.  She was desperate to come.  Desperate to feel him fill her up.

Steve grunted as he pumped himself in and out of her.   Looking at his wife’s face twisted into sexual bliss drove him even farther into insanity.  “I’m the only one who gets to see you this way,” he whispered as he pumped.  No one sees this face but me!”  Possession coursed through him.  He felt himself start to come.

I’m the only one who gets to see you this way …  Kayla pushed unwanted thoughts out of her head and pushed against her husband’s chest so she could flip over and straddle him.  Steve complied, and she grabbed the headboard as she easily slipped her slick walls back down over the erection that had already started to release into her.

“You’re the only man I ever wanted.  The only one I want to make love to me.  The only one I want to fuck me.  The only one I’ll ever want to touch me for the rest of my life!  STEVE!”  As he released another torrent inside of the woman that meant everything to him, Kayla’s orgasm sliced through her, causing her to shake wildly on top of him. 

“God, so beautiful, baby,” he said as her face showed the coital pleasure they shared.  “So beautiful when you come.”

Kayla crumpled on top of his chest and panted.  “I love you, Steve,” she whispered as he delicately stroked her back.  No one could replace you.  Not ever.”  Steve thought her choice of words was a bit strange, but he dismissed it quickly.  She felt his beating heart beneath her cheek and breathed deeply, trying to catch her breath.  “I love you.  It’s only ever been you.”  She held him tightly, and he felt that maybe something wasn’t quite right, but his bliss was too good to think there was anything going on.

She rolled over and snuggled her head into Steve’s neck.  She didn’t go to the bathroom or clean up or bother to go downstairs and turn out any lights.  She simply fell asleep clutching on to her husband, feeling how much he loved her and thanking God, again, for bringing him back to her. 

Kayla woke up in the middle of the night.  She knew exactly where and when she was.  Normally when she woke up on these jumps she would have split seconds of disorientation, but not this time.  Steve had rolled to the edge of the bed with his arm above his head.  He looked like a little boy sleeping peacefully with his hair having fallen over his eye.  She wanted to snuggle up against him, but she knew he needed to sleep off the alcohol and didn’t want to risk disturbing him.  She carefully got out of bed and went to the bathroom.  When she came out, Steve was still sleeping like the dead. 

Very softly, Kayla headed down the stairs and sat on the rug in front of the fireplace.  She was sated and well- loved, but she felt the guilt she tried hard to ignore now worm its way to the surface.  Her mind drifted to what to do about her sister’s trial.  This was a big deal.  She knew she should be there.  But she also knew how it was all going to turn out.  She gave her father the clue about Gillian, and the truth was that she just didn’t want to face Shane.  She really didn’t. She knew if she went to the trial that Steve would be going with her, and the concept of the brothers-in-law crossing paths brought more anxiety to her than she cared to admit. Shame set upon her for so many reasons.  Shame for having pursued the relationship with him, the man her sister loved, and for doing it when she wasn’t over Steve – or maybe because of it.  But the most shame came from not having told Steve about it.  She skirted the identity of the man she tried to move on with, but this omission was as bad as if she’d lied entirely.  It was a lie.  To her it was a lie.  And the longer she went without telling him, the worse the lie was.  Shane had barely come up as a topic since Steve returned to her, especially since he and Kimberly were divorced.  But now they were there in Salem together, and she didn’t know if she could keep them from meeting.

Plus, Kayla just wasn’t ready to meet that many people head on.  One at a time like Chris at Shenanigans, or in bite sized pieces like at her folks’ house.  Those worked for her. But actually going to the courthouse?  Seeing her entire family?  Dealing with the guilty verdict?  She didn’t want to have to do this.  If election night taught her anything it was that remembering who she was supposed to be with so many people at once was not something she looked forward to. 

I’m the only one who gets to see you this way …  It drifted into her head, reinforcing the guilt.  Kayla started to cry.  “Dammit!” she cursed softly.  “I’m sorry.”  She pulled her knees in tight and rested her cheek on them as she whimpered. 

The blanket being placed lovingly around her shoulders startled her.  “Steve!” she yelped as she quickly tried to hide her tears from him.  “Did I wake you?  I’m sorry.”

“Why are you crying, Kayla?  Is it your pop?”

It would be so easy to lie.  It was perfect. But that would only make it worse.  She shook her head and turned away from him.

“Baby, what is it?  Did … did I hurt you up there?”

“No,” she laughed without humor.  “No.”

He sat opposite her.  He tilted her chin toward him, but she gently moved it away, not wanting to face him.  “Then what?” 

Kayla hung her head and continued to cry.  “You love me so much.”

“That makes you sad?”

“I slept with someone when you were dead,” she blurted before she could stop herself.  Steve stopped cold, jealousy snaking slowly down his spine.  “Only you weren’t dead.”  He couldn’t speak.  He was afraid if he did he’d say something very wrong.  “I wasn’t ready.  I thought I was, but I wasn’t, and it was a huge m-m-mistake.  I tried to move on, get over you.”

“Did it work,” Steve asked as calmly as he could.

“No.  I left Salem to start a new life as your widow and nothing more, that’s how well that worked.”

Now Steve’s heart skipped a beat, possibly three.  Salem?  Not LA?  Steve knew that she’d left Salem two years after he’d died, so the fact that this happened in Salem struck him as … soon.  Who?  He wanted to ask the question, but he innately knew that he probably knew whomever this was, and a few pieces to a puzzle he hadn’t known existed suddenly fell into place.  She’s never said his name.  I don’t want to know. I don’t want to fucking know. 

“Are you there,” she chanced a look at his face and saw him working the muscle in his jaw.

“Not going anywhere.”  No baby.  No Sweetness.  Just the statement.

“He’s seen my face when I—“

“Stop.  No more.  I—I can’t.”  Steve got up.  Kayla watched Steve’s demeanor turn fiery before her eyes. 

“Do you still love me?”

“That’s a stupid question!” he boomed.  “I’ll never love anyone else!”

Kayla shrank back into herself, her guilt starting to consume her.  “I’m sorry,” she cried.  “You can’t know what it was like.  Something inside me broke.  I wanted to die.”

This brought Steve to his senses.  He saw his wife’s pain while continuing to feel his own, but he thought back to their talk in Stockholm.  She had one.  You had nine, and she thought you were dead.  “I’m sorry I yelled at you,” he said far more gently as he kneeled back down beside her.  “I knew you’d tried with someone.  You said so.  I knew what that meant.  You shouldn’t have been expected to be … celibate.”  His heart constricted even as he said it.

“I can’t help feeling so guilty, Steve.  I would do anything to take it back.  I would do anything to make you my only one.”

“Well, it’s not like you were a virgin.”

“It wasn’t the same with Chris.  You really were the only man to bring me that kind of pleasure.  To share that kind of connection.  But this man … I …”

“You connected like that?  You loved him?”  He struggled to get that out.

Kayla saw the fear in his eye that the next words out of her mouth might actually be yes, and she knew in that moment that she could never tell him that it was Shane.  “No,” she stressed, “No, Steve, I did-not-love-him.  I thought I did at the time and tried to convince myself that I did.  I tried so hard to love him, and I let him in.  But it wasn’t what we have.  You’re the only man I’ve ever been this kind of deeply in love with.  I love you, baby, I love only you.  But I did ha-have se-sex with him.  And I … did … he did see … my … face … when I …”

“Ok.  I don’t – I don’t – need you to say it.” Steve put a hand on her shoulder and hung his head in his other hand.  “God, Kayla, please don’t say it.” 

She touched his face, and her touch made his stomach flip.  “You’re the only man, Steve—“

“But I’m not!” Steve suddenly seethed with a new wave of anger.  “All those times you said I was the only man, I wasn’t!  Someone else gave you that pleasure.  Someone else gave you what belongs to me!”  He teared up despite himself.

Kayla’s heart started to break.  “I’m sorry.  I was broken!  Please, Steve.  Please don’t stop loving me!”

Now Steve really saw the damage he was about to do.  How could she ever think he might stop loving her?  He saw the guilt in her eyes and wondered how long she’d been carrying this around with her.  He was so quickly forgiven for the women he was with, now it was his turn.

“Kayla, baby,” his voice softened.  “Stop, you’re not broken.  Don’t ever say that.  I’m the one who’s sorry, I’m sorry.”  He reached for her and pulled her into his arms.  “And I told you, I could never stop loving you.  There’s nothing you could do in this world that would make me stop loving you.”

“You forgive me?”

“There’s nothing to forgive.”  Despite the pain he still felt at the fact that someone else was inside of her, giving her the pleasure that was theirs alone to share, he truly released it and had to make her see that he had.  “Neither of us were angels.  You thought I was dead, I thought I was single.”  Kayla nodded.  “Am I the only one now?”

“Of course, you are!” her face stricken that he’d even ask the question.  “How could you even ask that?!”

“How could you even ask if I still loved you?”  A tear slid down Steve’s face.  Kayla bit her bottom lip and wiped it away with her thumb.  “Now I don’t want to hear you cry anymore.  We’ve been happy for four days.  Let’s see how much longer we can keep that up, ok, baby?”  She nodded.  “I need to hear you say it.  Ok?”

“Ok.”

They walked back up to bed, and this time it was Steve who snuggled up against Kayla.  He needed to feel her warmth.  He kissed her, and when their lips met, he could feel her tension. 

“Kayla,” he said, “We’re ok.  I love you.  I’m not mad.”

Kayla held him tighter.  “I love you, too,” she said.

Steve fell asleep fully aware that she continued to not tell him who this person was and being ok with that.  Kayla did the same, fully aware that she was not going to Kimberly’s trial tomorrow or any day after that.

Chapter Text

Find Me
Chapter 44

Two mornings later Kayla lay in bed antsy.  She laid on her side blinking the sleep out of her eyes listening to her husband snore lightly behind her, the morning not quite upon him yet.  True to his word, they really were ok, but there was a lingering tension that ran just beneath the surface.  Vague insecurity tugged very gently at them like a rustle through autumn leaves.  And despite the fact that they’d made love twice since that night, they both still felt that tension, faint thought it was.  They each thought it might just be in their own minds.  Neither one wanted to ask the questions, and no answers were, therefore, provided.  Instead, the topic of Kayla’s relationship while he was presumed dead was dropped. 

Now Kayla stood in the kitchen having just finished doing the breakfast dishes, and Steve sat on the couch flipping channels on the TV.  It was strange to have nowhere to go and nothing to distract them.  If they were at home, they would be preparing for their outing with Joe, going through the daily routine of mundane family life.  But this jump did feel like home.  In some ways it felt more like home than their apartment back in 2009.  This place felt real to them.  It felt like theirs.  They were bonded to it.  Nothing bonded them to their apartment in their own time, it was their children and being together as a family that made that place their home.  But their children weren’t here.  They were; but Joe and Stephanie weren’t.  And this wasn’t their time.  So kicking back and behaving like this was home was an invisible line in the sand that neither of them wanted to cross.

The day after their fight Kayla filled Steve in on her sister’s trial, then he watched her lie to her mother when she called to say there was an emergency at the hospital and she’d have to miss it.  Then in the interest of avoiding the trial, they mainly sat around, watched TV, tried to figure out where their family and friends were at this point, and whiled away the time.  Today Kayla wanted to go somewhere together, but discussing what to do with their time became an unexpected bone of contention, as Steve was more interested in visiting old haunts.  Nice as it was to just do nothing for a change, she didn’t want another day of hanging around.   

“I’m bored, Steve.  Aren’t you kind of bored?”

“Not really.  You wanna get out of the house?”

“Yeah, but not the courthouse.  Too many people to navigate and remember at the same time.”

“How about visiting your pop again, I wouldn’t mind seeing Frankie and the little dude.”  Kayla’s ears did perk up here, but it was so hard to leave him the first time that she wasn’t sure she could tear herself away a second.  When Kayla declined this, Steve got clearly annoyed.

“I’m sorry, I just … I kind of wanted to go do something.”

“Wanna shoot some pool with me at the Heart?”

Not really.  But she felt like she was getting into nagging territory so she just relented.  “Yeah, ok.  Sure.”

Steve could see she was humoring him.  “What, Kayla?  What’s wrong with the Heart?  You used to love stalking me there.”

“I said ok, it’s fine.”

“Don’t patronize me, baby, if you don’t wanna go I’m not gonna make you.”

“I’m not patronizing you!  I just wanted to do something fun together, like take a drive or see the museum or something.  Enjoy the day off.”

Steve’s reaction was to fly off the handle.  “What do you think this is, Kayla, a vacation?” he asked harshly.  You want to take in a show, is that it?  See the fishies in the aquarium?  We’re almost out of food, we need groceries.  And my jeans are about to walk away by themselves, you know?”

Kayla threw the dishtowel onto the counter, crossed her arms in front of her and glared at him.  “Fine.  You go grocery shopping and I’ll do the laundry, God forbid I suggest we spend any time together.”

“Right, baby, ‘cause we haven’t had any time together in three weeks!” 

The look on Kayla’s face held both anger and hurt, and Steve was immediately sorry he had yelled at her.  He plowed his hand through his hair and said, “I’m sorry, Sweetness, I don’t know why I just said that.”

“You’re still mad at me about the other night,” she said softly.  “That’s why.”

“No I’m not,” he said firmly but calmly.  “I’m not, Sweetness.”

She knew it wasn’t true, but she didn’t want to deepen the fight.  Steve went to her and pulled her into an embrace.   “I don’t’ want you thinkin’ that, baby.”

Kayla closed her eyes and melted into him.  He was on edge whether he wanted to admit it or not. 

“You wanna go do something, what do you wanna do?  Wanna see a movie … that we’ve already seen?”  Kayla laughed.  She felt his black tank under her cheek, and he still smelled like his morning shower.  “How about skating, you wanna go skating?”

NO!  Steve thought he felt Kayla tense. 

“You know what I think,” she replied quickly, “I think you’re right about needing to run some errands.  You don’t have a lot of clothes here, and I do need to do laundry.” 

Steve looked at her curiously.  “Now you want to run errands?”

Kayla opened the fridge, that tension briefly showing itself.  “Those were the last of the eggs, so maybe we should go to the store.”

“Yeah, ok.  We can do that.”  His tone was less than enthusiastic.

Kayla didn’t like this feeling at all.  She knew it was the other night causing this spat, and she didn’t know how to fix it.   Steve looked at her, and the conversation welled up in his head.  It was a strange feeling. It wasn’t anger, really, more like insecurity. 

“You mind if I shoot some pool at the Heart?” he asked.  “I need to go pay the March rent, anyway.  You can do what you need to do around here.  I’ll get some groceries, too.”  He could tell immediately that Kayla didn’t like that idea.

And she didn’t.  Kayla didn’t like that idea at all.  “Sure,” she said, her blue eyes betraying her true feelings.  “Go ahead.”

Steve nodded.  “Ok.”  He got his jacket and slid open the door.  Then he looked back up at her and saw she was still standing in the same spot by the fridge.  He went to her, kissed her and said, “I’ll be back.  Won’t be long,” then he left closing the loft door behind him.  Kayla stood with her arms folded wondering what just happened, when the door slid back open and Steve poked his head in.  Kayla whipped her head back around.  “I love you, Sweetness.”

Kayla let out the breath she’d been holding and gave him a small smile.  “I love you, too.”  Steve smiled back at her and left again.

It wasn’t quite what she had planned, but with a mixture of relief and annoyance she gathered up two loads of laundry, headed to the basement with a stack of magazines, and lost herself for a while. 

Steve stood in the middle of the produce section and let the gears turn in his head.  He didn’t like how the morning went.  Why did he fly off the handle at her this morning?  She thought he was still mad at her.  He wasn’t.  Then why was he still feeling jealousy that left him cold?  It wasn’t the first time this relationship came up.  When she told him that night he got his memories back that she’d tried one time, he wasn’t affected this way.  The one-off remarks about it were very few and even farther between, and they didn’t elicit any kind of reaction in him. But it was the first time he’d seen how affected she was by it, how guilty she felt about it, and he realized that that’s what made him so uneasy – her reaction, not that it happened.  Yet when he told her about the women he’d had, she forgave him.  Why was this turnabout not fair play?  He saw my face when I--.  He tried to shake it away.  Who, Kayla?  Who was it that saw your face?  Why aren’t you telling me?

Steve shopped then left the groceries in the car, which was like a refrigerator in these early-February temperatures.  He went to Shenanigans to pay the March rent so his mother and sister could live there for as long as this jump would be lasting.  He thought it through a little more and realized that the odds they’d make it that far were slim, they’d never stayed anywhere that long, but there was no reason not to do it, so he left the rent money with Joey to give to Chris, who was at the courthouse defending Kim.  He was just about to head to the Cheatin’ Heart to shoot some pool when he remembered his pool cue.  My wife gave me the best cue ever made.  Can’t lose with that one.  The sudden desperate need to have the cue Kayla gave him hit him hard and he smiled a little sadly.  He used his key to enter his apartment to get his pool cue to see Adrienne sitting on the bed with various family photos out in front of her.

She screamed at the sudden and unexpected intrusion, realized who it was, then with great commotion began gathering up the photos hoping to God her brother didn’t see them.  He had, but pretended that he didn’t.

“I’m sorry!  I didn’t realize you’d be coming!  I thought this was just for me to stay!  I’ll go, I’m so sorry!”

“Easy, baby, easy, calm down, you’re not goin’ anywhere.”

“I just – I –“ she started to get up.

“Adrienne sit your ass back down and take a breath, will you please?” Adrienne quickly did as she was told as naturally as if she’d been raised with him.  He watched her get her breathing in check through the corner of his eye while he grabbed his cue case from the table.  “Baby, anybody ever tell you you’re jumpy?”  Adrienne smiled, a little caution underlying her features.  “It’s ok.  I’m not stayin’,” he said as he sat down heavily in the chair.

“Ok,” she looked at him strangely as his actions didn’t match his words, “then what are you doing here?”

“Just came to get my pool cue.”  He was silent for a few moments, then added with a sigh, “Kayla gave it to me.”  Steve dragged his eye to the floor and stared for a moment.

Adrienne wasn’t sure what was happening here.  It was the weirdest feeling, like he was confiding in her.  Of all people.

“Is, um.  Is something wrong?”  Steve didn’t reply, just continued staring at the floor.  “You two have a fight or something?”  Steve nodded and held the pool cue to his chest.

“She kick you out?” she asked nervously.

Steve looked up at her.  “Kayla would never do that.”

“So then you don’t need your place back?”

Steve shook his head. 

“You should go to her.  Say you’re sorry.”

Steve got an arrogant look on his face.  “Why do you automatically assume I’m the one who messed up?”

Adrienne knew she was treading on thin ice.  She’d made so much progress with him, saying the wrong thing here might mean she ruined it all.  But she was feeling brave.  “I don’t.  But I can see how much she loves you, so just go and make up.  Don’t waste time being mad when you can have a girl like that.”

She was right.  He was still feeling the effects of it all, but the urge to hold Kayla in his arms and tell her he loved her was suddenly very strong.  The Cheatin’ Heart was now the last thing on his mind. 

Steve stood up, shoved the cue case under his arm and walked over to his sister.  He held her chin so much like his own in his hand, and she let him almost defiantly.

“Ya know what, Little Girl?  Dimples is a lucky man.”  Then he laughed at the confused look on her face and said, “Thanks for the pep talk, baby.”  He turned to go, bounded up the stairs, then turned back toward her.  “I thought you were gonna find a real payin’ job, now.  You should try the Cheatin’ Heart,” he said right before he shut the door behind him.  “Might own the place one day.” 

When he appeared in the laundry room doorway, Kayla’s heart sped up and her stomach started forming nervous knots.  She’d just folded the last of his t-shirts and was packing the laundry basket for the trip back up to the apartment.  He walked over to the dryer she was standing against and just looked at her. 

“Hello,” she said softly.

“Hi, Sweetness,” he said. He saw Kayla react to his use of her pet name and reached into his leather jacket.  He handed her the single yellow rose that he’d bought at the grocery store and gave it to her.  “I’m sorry … for whatever that was back there.”

“Steve,” she whispered.  She brought the little sunburst to her nose and shook her head.  “It’s ok.”

Steve caressed her face and exhaled heavily.  She didn’t say anything, just looked at him with those big blue eyes.  Then he slowly pulled her into his arms and started swaying with her.  “I do love you, Sweetness.”

“I love you.  She leaned up and kissed the scar on his cheek.  “And you now have clean clothes.”

Steve smiled.  “That and fresh eggs in the fridge?  Who says this was a boring day?”

Steve carried the laundry basket back up to their apartment.  The blip had passed, but the tension lingered.

When they made love that night no words were spoken.   Only when he exploded inside of her and felt her own shudders begin to subside did Steve gently kiss her face over and over and tell her again how much he loved her.  Kayla looked up at her husband, who was still pulsing faintly inside of her. 

“What are you lookin’ at, Sweetness?”

“Mmmm,” she smiled.  “Just you.  Why didn’t we spend all day doing this?”

“Hey, I told you I wanted to stay in the house, didn’t I?”

“Yes, you told me,” she acquiesced, “My bad.”

“Better watch your slang, baby.  No one says, ‘my bad,’ in 1987.”

“Fair enough,” she giggled.  “NOT.”

“Aren’t we a little too early for that, too?”

“Hmm … you’re really making me think back, I don’t know that I still have the brain cells for that.”

“Of course, you do, you’re 20 years younger.”

“Ugh, you’re killing me!”

As they fell asleep, the current of their spat, fueled by their fight two nights before, eased to a very thin haze.  When Steve woke up the next day he didn’t feel the tension quite as much, and what he did feel he pushed away.  Kayla was sleeping heavily, but he was starving.  He felt slightly bad for waking her, but he knew she was due back at the Emergency Center.  “Sweetness,” he whispered with a kiss to her shoulder, “Time to rise and shine.  We have to go to work.”  Kayla rolled over and reached for him. 

“Mmm,” she moaned sleepily.  “Are we still here?”

“February 1987,” he replied. 

“What is this day six,” she asked?

“Seven.”

“Ok,” she said.  “Well off we go, then.”

An hour later they were at Shenanigans having breakfast before it was time to go to work.

“Are you sure you want to go with me?  It’s ok if you want to do your own thing.  You don’t have to come with.”  She was hoping he’d say no, but she wanted to give him the opportunity to back out.

“No, baby, I think we should stay together.  We’ve proven we can be on our own, we don’t have to keep proving it.  Let’s stay together.  Besides, I’m enjoying myself there.  I love watching you work.”

“And you love giving Brad a hard time.”

“Oh, I do like that, it’s true.”

Shenanigans was crowded as they sat at the table closest to the back door.  Kayla was wearing a red sweater with a heart in the front and a long black skirt.  Steve wore a white button down shirt and his brown leather jacket with a pair of freshly washed jeans.

“I always liked that sweater on you, baby.  You look like a long-stemmed rose.”  Kayla laughed and leaned over the table for a sweet kiss.  Steve then took her hand in his and brought it to his lips.  “Sweetness … do you have to go right in to work?  Can someone cover for you?”

“Ah, I don’t know.  I’d have to remember who to call.  Why?”

This haze that had set upon them since that bad night was eating at him.  He knew it was eating at her, too.  He didn’t know what to do about it, but he did know something that would make them both feel a little better. 

Sweetness … I want us to go to the courthouse today and get married.”

Kayla dropped her fork, and it clattered to the floor.  “You what?”

“We’re not married here yet.”

“I thought I wasn’t allowed to say that,” she joked.

“I’m serious, Kayla. There’s no reason we can’t go get married right now.  Buy a license, say I do, done.”

A smile lit up her face.  “You really are serious, aren’t you?”

“I know I said you don’t need a ring here, but I was wrong, you do need a ring here.  I need us to be married.”

Kayla wanted nothing more.  And now that he’d said it she wanted it right now.  But she was worried about where this was suddenly coming from.  She didn’t want to say it and ruin this moment, but she couldn’t handle any more dishonesty between them.

“Is this about the other night?” she asked solemnly.

Steve’s eye flickered.  “No,” he said firmly.

“Are … are you sure?”

“Kayla, there’s something not right between us.”

“I know,” she softened. 

“I need us to be married.”

“We are married.”

“Here.  I need us to be married here.”

“You think a piece of paper here or a ring on my finger will make the other night stop bothering you?”

“It’s not bothering me, Kayla!”

“Really, is that why you’re snapping at me?”

“Kayla, I just asked you to marry me, are you saying no?  Again?”

“Now that’s not fair!”

Steve leaned back heavily in his chair and got that jaw muscle moving again.  “Sorry,” he said as he glared at his eggs.  Kayla didn’t say anything.  Steve looked up at her.  “This … thing … I’ll get past it.  That’s not why I want to do this.  But I think it couldn’t hurt, baby.  I think we both need this.  I love you.”

“I love you, too, Steve.  So much.”

“Then let’s just go get married.  I want us to be mar—“ the pull in his gut was so strong he gripped the table.   No!  The room very slowly started to spin.  Steve looked up at Kayla and locked eyes with her.  She’s still here, right?  “Kayla!” Steve yelled so loudly that the entire restaurant turned to look.  He grabbed for her, and she immediately thrust her hands into his, instinctively aware that he’d felt the jump effect begin.

“Steve!” Her voice was panicked, and he knew that she knew what was happening.

He felt her hands in his, but the whole room had all but spun away.  “You still here?”

“Yes!  Ready to get married!”

“Did you jump?  Baby?!”  He reached over the table trying to find her face, sending the breakfast dishes crashing to the floor.  She found his hands and held them tightly.

“No, I don’t feel anything!  Steve!”

But he didn’t hear a word she said, his awareness had already jumped, leaving his destination body frozen right in front of her, a completely blank expression on his face.  “Steve?” she said, knowing full well he was gone.  “Steve!”  She was oblivious to the crowd that thought she was off her rocker.  She didn’t notice when Chris ran over to her wondering what on earth was wrong with her.  All she knew was that Steve had impossibly jumped away, leaving her behind, and this body that had just made love to her just a few short hours ago was now frozen in her arms, empty of the soul that had merged with it. 

Kayla brought Steve’s hands to her face as she hung her head and cried.  All she could do was wait.  Ten seconds. I can do anything for ten seconds.  “Clavicle … scapula … humerus … radius …”

“Kayla what the hell is goin’ on here?” Chris demanded.

“Ulna … carpas,” she continued ignoring him while she cried.  “Metacarpus—“ that’s when she felt the tug in her own belly, relieved to finally go.  As the vision before her went askew and the room began to fall away from her, she registered that the body that was her husband hadn’t moved since he went blank.  She wasn’t sure if he was even still breathing.

“Kayla!” Chris shouted.

It was too late.  She was gone.

With Steve’s next blink he found himself in almost the very spot that he’d just left.  He was still in Shenanigans but now he was at a different table, and the smell of the place was completely different.  Gone were the breakfast smells of bacon and eggs, replaced with a more lunchy burger and fry smell.  “Baby?” he called to her.  No answer came, and Steve doubled over with what he decided then and there was the worst bout of jump sickness he’d ever experienced.  It took everything he had not to vomit, and the food smells weren’t helping.  Luckily, it passed quickly. 

When he opened his eyes, he instinctively reached for his patch and tried to get his bearings.   He felt a bandana around his head and winced.  Great.  He then looked down at his arms and lap to see what else he was wearing.  Denim jacket, grey tank top, jeans.  Whenever this was, it wasn’t winter anymore.  His eyes drifted to the right toward his apartment.  He did a double take when he saw Savannah Wilder standing on crutches talking to Kosichek.  She was one of the last people he wanted to see.  If she was here, then that meant he was probably working for Victor Kiriakis.  Not a good time for them to jump into.  Kayla.  Where are you? 

When he looked up, he saw her.  Walking into Shenanigans like an angel.  She wore a grey blazer with blue and pink accents and a wide, black, plaid pattern, and a pair of pants he knew she was going to hate.  Her blonde curls framed her face, and she was the most beautiful thing he’d ever seen in his life.  Relief washed over him as he took her in.   She went right to the bar and appeared to be looking for him. 

He wasted no time going to her.  I’m right here, baby.  Before he could say anything, however, Kosichek got to her first.  

“Hello Blue eyes,” Chris said from behind her.

Kayla turned.  “Hello Chris,” she replied sheepishly.

“Heard you were back in town.”

“Yeah, we’re both back in town, aren’t we, Sweetness?” Steve interjected from behind Chris.

“Uh yeah,” Kayla said as she looked at Chris with confusion.  “I just got back. Alot's going on with my family.”

“And now that her family’s here, Kosichek, why not go talk to your girlfriend.”

Kayla blanched. 

“Well, why don’t you stay out of which girlfriend I choose to talk to, Patch.”  Steve waited for Kayla to react to the name she so hated, but the reaction didn’t come.  Steve was confused.  Was that not her in there?  Did she not jump?  Steve’s heart began to race.

“Kayla?”  She darted her eyes at Chris, and Steve’s heart began to sink.  “Do you remember Stockholm?”

“What the hell are you doin’, Patch?”

Steve grabbed her by the shoulders.  “Do you remember Stockholm, Kayla?”  Steve searched her eyes for recognition.  It wasn’t there.

“No!” she huffed as Chris physically removed Steve’s hands from her and gave him a shove against his chest. 

“You watch yourself!” he spat, holding a finger out to him.  “You keep your hands to yourself!”  Chris’s eyes were wide and full of warning. 

I jumped first.  This time I was the one who jumped first.  Back then Steve would have shoved Chris back.  Now Steve stood there not knowing what to do.  He tried not to panic and watched with dread as Kayla shrank back from him, clearly afraid.  She was afraid of him.  My God, she really was.  How long before I arrived the last two times?  Kayla said a minute. Or was it more than a minute?  It had already been a full minute.  She wasn’t there yet.  Where was she?  

“Yeah, uh … sorry,” Steve said to her in a tone he’d hoped sounded rational.  “Didn’t mean to scare you.”

“Pfft.”  Steve turned his head to see Savannah glaring at the whole exchange.  He ignored her and turned back to Kayla. 

“I’m not myself, sorry.  I’m Steve Johnson,” he said holding out his hand.

“She’s not interested, now get out of here,” Chris said moving to stand squarely between he and Kayla.

Kayla nodded at Steve slightly in acknowledgement behind Chris and held up her hand awkwardly, clearly wanting nothing to do with him.  She thinks I’m nuts.  He watched her eyes dart up and down in discomfort and was torn between hanging back and waiting for her to arrive, and carrying her off to his apartment until her consciousness caught up.  Or maybe he should just go to his apartment and wait for her; home base.  I heard you were back in town, he remembered Chris’s words.  That’s when he realized when this was.  She wasn’t even living here yet, she was just visiting after he’d trashed her place in Cleveland.  And that meant that that place downstairs was still Bo & Hope’s place, he wasn’t living there yet.  So much for home base.  God, everything is messed up!

While he was thinking all this through, Chris had turned back around toward Kayla and dismissed him.  Steve stood behind them.  Alone.

“How've you been?” Chris he asked her.

“Good,” she said quietly.  “You?”

When Chris hugged her and he saw her hugging him back with something like contentment, he almost went with the whisking her away option.  Instead he sat down at the table he was at before and watched them closely.  Steve was breathing rapidly and tried to control himself waiting for Kayla to arrive.  It had been seven or eight minutes, now, and he got more agitated with every moment that passed.  Eventually Savannah sat down opposite him. 

“Mind if I join you,” she asked with disdain.

“Yes,” he said.

“Who’s that girl Chris is talking to, Patch?”

“I said I mind,” he barked at her, “now get out of my face, Savannah.”

Savannah balked. “Your concern for my leg is touching, Patch.”  She then went back to her own table and stewed while Steve turned his attention back to his wife.

“Alot's happened since you went away,” Chris said.  They’d moved to sit at the table next to him now.

“I know.  How's John Henry?” Kayla asked.  She looked so awkward.  Steve didn’t like how she was looking at Chris.  He could tell she was remembering old times.  Please get here, baby, I’m losin’ it!

“Big as a house.  In fact, I think he ate the house,” he joked.

“Remember when I gave him to you?”

“I do,” Chris said with smooth charm.  “I do remember.”  Steve tried very hard to stay calm while Chris’s eyes smoldered into Kayla’s.

“He was such a cute little …” she trailed off as her body stiffened.

Steve sat bolt upright watching as her features went completely blank.  This is it.  Come on, baby, come back to me!

“Yeah.  Well, he's not so little anymore,” Chris went on, oblivious.  When Kayla didn’t say anything he touched her hand.  “We've got alot to catch up on.  Alot to talk about.”  Steve was focused on Kayla and didn’t notice when Chris got a confused look in his eye.

Kayla sucked in a breath like she hadn’t breathed for day.  Chris startled and let go of her hand.  Her eyes darted around and she got so dizzy she fell off her chair.

“Kayla?” Chris said in concern.

“Steve?!” she mercifully called to him.  “Where …?”

“Here, baby, I’m here!”  He got on his knees next to her.  “Been waiting for you, goin’ out of my mind.”

“Patch what the hell are you doin’?!”

“Shut up, Kosichek!”

“I’m gonna throw up,” she moaned.

“Swallow it down, baby, you can do it.”  She reached for him, and he pulled her into his chest.  Chris looked upon all this with utter bewilderment.

Kayla clutched on to him and kept her eyes closed.  It was him!  She was never so nauseous from the jump effect, but she was also so happy that it was actually him this time.  Did she hear him correctly, he was waiting for her? 

“Sweetness, do you remember Stockholm?”

Kayla knew what he was waiting for and started to answer him.  “What is …,” she had to stop to swallow down her gorge.

“Do you remember Stockholm, Kayla?!”

“Twenty questions!” she choked out.

“Oh, baby, he held her tighter.  “Thank god.”  Then he kissed the top of her head.

“Kayla, you mind tellin’ me what the hell is goin’ on here?” Chris yelled, fully aware that there was now a scene in his bar.

“Yes, she minds!” Steve answered for her.  With that he stood her up carefully and held her face.  “You ok now?”

“Better,” she said.  “Much better.  You got here first?”

“Yeah.”

She reached up and hugged him.  Chris put his hands on his hips in disgust.  Savannah smiled.

“Do you still want to get married?” she whispered in his ear.

Steve laughed.  “Every day.”

She pulled back from him and looked him up and down.  “Have you been here long?,” keeping her voice low.

“Probably ten minutes.”

Kayla was shocked.  Steve glanced at Chris behind her, and she turned to follow his gaze. 

“Chris!”

“What’s goin’ on here, Kayla?  You almost passed out just now.”

“I’m fine, just … low blood sugar.”  Chris looked angrily at Steve.  “Steve and I are old friends.”

“Really?  Since when, the last five minutes?”

“We met in …”

“Cleveland,” Steve provided.

“Cleveland!” Kayla repeated.

“Let’s get out of here, baby,” Steve bent down to whisper to her. 

“I’ll, ah, talk to you later.”

“You’re leaving with that guy?”

“I’ll be back!  It was good to see you.”

“No you won’t,” Steve muttered to himself.

They left Chris and Savannah at Shenanigans without another word to either of them and stopped at the steps to his apartment. 

“Baby it’s not mine yet, we’re too early.  Let’s go to the pier.”

“What?  When are we?”

“All I know for sure is it’s 1986.  Pretty sure it’s right after I trashed your apartment in Cleveland.”

“You sure?” she asked.

He chuckled.  “No.  But I do know that I was here for almost ten minutes before you got here.”

“How … how is that possible?”

“I don’t know, Sweetness.  How long before you jumped?” 

“Right after you.  Seconds.”

They were at the pier now. He held her hand in his and kept touching her face.  He couldn’t stop touching her, he needed to be touching her.  “I was out of my mind.  You didn’t know me.  Now I know what you went through.”

“Nerve-wracking, isn’t it?”

“You could say that, yeah.  I sat there watching you make puppy eyes at Kosichek for I don’t know how long.”  He looked at her and ran his fingers through her hair.  “I need to kiss you.”  Kayla smiled, and he brushed her lips with his.  More relief flooded through him.  “Kiss me, baby,” he said as they caressed each other’s faces.  “Kiss me.”   They finally broke, and she leaned up against him.

“Where do we go now?  I don’t live here,” Kayla said.

“And I live in a pit.  We’re not going there.”

“Do we have a choice?  Where else are we going to go?  I … I don’t know where to go.”

“Baby, I … I got complacent there.  I wasn’t ready to jump.  It hit so fast I wasn’t prepared.  Then we jumped from Shenanigans right back into Shenanigans.  Got real sick from the jump this time.”

“Me, too.”

“I know,” he smiled.  “Chris didn’t know what the hell was goin’ on.”

“Poor Chris,” she chuckled.

“Poor Chris?” Steve scowled.  “He really let me have it when I started talkin’ to you in there.  I didn’t know it wasn’t you, and he got all territorial.”  Kayla gave him a sympathetic look and Steve’s face turned serious.  “Kayla, when I realized you weren’t in there yet, I went out of my mind.  You’d been jumping first, I just assumed you were there lookin’ for me.”

“Well, I didn’t have it any easier when you left,” she said.  “One minute you wanted to get married, and the next you were gone.  Just completely gone.  It was a shock.”

They sat on the same bench that they had sat on the night Kayla saw her father.  “You were scared of me,” Steve said as he tucked her hair behind her ear.  “When I went up to you just now, before you got here.”  Kayla looked into his deep green eye and saw how hurt he was.  “Did I scare you when we first met?  I did, didn’t I?”

Kayla held his face in her hands and kissed him.  “A little,” she said.  “But I saw who you were really quickly.  You know that.  You could never scare me now.  Never.”

The tension from their previous jump had dissipated in light of the chaos they were now trying to find their way through.  Steve wrapped his arms around her and breathed her in.  Kayla melted into his arms and felt safe.

The feeling was short-lived.

Steve’s anxiety shot through the roof when he felt the telltale pull at his diaphragm.  “Shit!  Kayla, I’m jumping again.”  Kayla let out a sob and tried to pull away to see him, but he held her tight.  “No, baby.  Just hold me while I go.”

Tears stung Kayla’s eyes.  “Don’t go,” she cried.  He held her tighter.  “I guess I’ll be right behind you.”  She threaded her fingers through his hair and kissed his neck.”

“Love you, Sweetness.”

“I love you, too.”  It was the last thing he heard before he went rigid in her arms.  And she knew he was gone.

Kayla cried against the empty shell that her husband had just started inhabiting 20 short minutes ago.  She pretended he was there with her and talked to him to keep herself calm as she waited for her own jump.  “Where do you think we’re going?  Maybe our wedding.  The one on the yacht.  The beautiful wedding you planned.  Or maybe home,” grief suddenly gripped her.  “You think maybe we’ll go home?”  She buried her head into his shoulder, and the jump effect took her.  

Steve arrived to a body that immediately felt foreign to him.  The feeling of wrongness was so strong that it transcended the effect that arriving usually had on his body.  He was in a hotel room, naked from the waist up.  He sat on the edge of a bed and knew that the woman in his arms was not his wife.  It only took a second for him to place the perfume scent that assailed his nostrils.  It was a scent he’d spent a lifetime trying to forget.

As the truth dawned on him his stomach churned in disgust.  He jerked back from her and paled.  The eyes staring back at him belonged to Marina.

Chapter Text

Find Me
Chapter 45

Steve hoped to God he was dreaming again.  Unfortunately, this felt very real.  He was half-naked face to face with a woman he hated so much that the sight of her called up the worst kind of demons.  His head was swimming.  When was this?  Was he married to her?  Could he possibly have jumped that far back to his early 20’s? 

“I’m Fine now,” were the first words out of anyone’s mouth, and the mouth belonged to Marina. 

His hand flew up to his face to find two eyes.  He quickly discerned from his vision that he was only seeing out of one of them, however.  He was married to Kayla.  Thank you, God, I’m married to Kayla.  Where am I?  Steve’s head jerked from side to side as he tried to assess his surroundings.  Italy.  I’m in Italy getting that damned key.  He suddenly felt his hands on her shoulders and let go abruptly.  He felt sick.

“I’m fine now,” Marina repeated.

Oh God, get me out of here.  I’ve gotta go home!

Marina reacted to what she saw in Steve’s eyes.  She was working her next manipulation, and he could literally see it unfold.  “Steven,” she cooed with slight reservation based on the look in his eyes.  “I knew you’d come eventually.”  She went to touch his face, but Steve caught her wrist firmly, and held it between them.  “Don’t you touch me,” he warned in a firm whisper.  “Don’t.”  It would be so easy to snap her wrist like he’d recently dreamed.  He’d be lying if he said the thought didn’t cross his mind. That’s how much he hated this woman.  For what she’d put them through.  For making him miss precious time with Kayla while she was pregnant and living apart from him.  For tormenting Kayla so callously and maliciously.  For playing him like a fool from the day she met him until the time she really died.  He hated her.  There was no one on this earth he hated more other than maybe his father.

That’s when Marina saw Kayla and Jack standing directly opposite her in the doorway having overheard every word.  They’d approached so silently that neither she nor Steve had heard them.  Now that Steve’s back was to them and Marina had the upper hand, she would make sure she twisted the knife into Kayla’s heart as far and as hard as she could.  She unbuttoned the bodice of her nightgown and moved her face close to Steve’s.

“I’m leaving,” he said low under his breath and went to get up.

Not about to let that happen, Marina grabbed at him desperately.  “No, don’t talk, just kiss me!” Her voice was sultry and seductive, and Kayla stood heartbroken watching it all.  Like the first time around.  Steve was oblivious to his wife witnessing this event.  “Put your hands on me again and kiss me, Steven!”

Marina moved in to take his mouth with hers, and Steve jerked back so violently that he fell off the bed.  Repulsed, he looked up at her and put up a warning hand.

“Marina!” he shouted.  She looked upon him sexily, but Marina’s eyes betrayed her as they glanced up and away from him toward the door, a look of satisfaction on her face.  “What are you—“ Steve stopped short and he followed her gaze to the doorway … When he saw her standing there his blood ran cold.  Oh God, Sweetness.  That’s what drove the final wedge between them back then.  He’d been taken in by Marina’s ruse.  Her pretend bad dream to lure him in and separate him from Kayla. 

Steve knew she would be there when he very slowly turned his head.  He also knew without a doubt that this was not going to be his Kayla, but the one of this destination.  What he wasn’t prepared for was how haggard she looked.  He wasn’t prepared for the paleness of her skin and strain lining her face.  He wasn’t prepared for the devastation in her eyes.  Kayla was shattered.  She was positively shattered.  And he died a little right there on the floor of that god-forsaken hotel in Italy watching it. 

Kayla silently locked eyes with him.  Jack was looking upon him with concern and shock, but all Steve could do was look at Kayla while he lay frozen on the floor.  He was paralyzed.  This was the very nightmare that plagued him. 

“Ka-Kayla.”  His voice was choked with emotion.  Finally he found his legs and got up.  “Sweetness?”

Kayla’s face had been a mask until he called her Sweetness.  Her eyes flickered ever so slightly, silently revoking the honor of its use. 

“Steven.”  Marina’s voice was silky and conniving.  “I’m sorry she had to see us like this, but I am your wife.”

Kayla turned swiftly and ran, and Steve suddenly found a very strong voice.  “There is no us, Marina, and you’re not my wife!  Look what you did to her!” 

Jack stayed back to see this exchange and exhaled in relief. 

“I am your wife, Steven!  I am.  You loved me!”

Steve started recalling the terrible nightmare he had about her and the spiteful words he’d said to her.  When he repeated it here for real, he’d never meant anything he’d said to her more genuinely.  “That wasn’t love, that was a boy getting his rocks off, Marina.”  He spat her name like it was the plague.  “That’s all you ever were to me.  A woman I fucked. You should have stayed dead.”

“Steven!!!!!” Marina shrieked. 

“I have to fix this,” Steve cried, clamping his hands over his ears.  Then the truth of it dawned on him like a ton of bricks as he ran into the hallway and searched the direction she’d just run.  “Jesus, I can fix this!  Jack!” he turned toward his brother and grabbed his shoulders.  “That’s her, Jack!  That’s her, and I can fix it!”

“Steve,” Jack choked out, “go after her.  Please go after her, you have no idea.  You have no idea what’s happening here.  Please, go.” He did, though.  Steve did know now that Kayla was pregnant and that that’s why Jack had brought her to Italy.  He also knew that he could make this horrible mess he’d made right again.

Marina bounded out of bed.  “No!  No, Steve, I need you!” she pawed at him, grabbing the waistband of his jeans.  “I have the same dream every night, I need you!”

Having her hands on him anywhere was bad enough, but having them there made him feel almost violated.  Steve exploded.  He pushed Marina hard and she fell backwards on the bed. “I told you not to touch me!” he roared as he heard her head crack against the headboard.  He hated himself for doing everything surrounding this woman wrong the first time around.  “You keep her away from me, Jack,” he gasped.  “You keep her far away so I don’t kill her!  I’m going after Kayla!”

Jack nodded.  Steve saw the relief flood through him but couldn’t process any part of his relationship with his brother.  He just had to get to this Kayla before his Kayla jumped in.  He had to tell her that what she saw wasn’t real. It wasn’t how things were.  He had a chance to put right something that was completely and utterly wrong.  He had to fix his wife.  So the rest of it would just never happen.  The fact that it was going to reset didn’t even whisper its way through his brain.

“Go,” Jack said.  “I’ve got Marina.”  He let out a nervous sound.  “Please go get her.”

Steve turned on his heel and ran after Kayla.  How long since she’d run, a minute?  Two?  He ran shirtless down the hallway toward the elevators.  He rounded the corner just in time to see one of them closing and just knew without question that Kayla was on it. 

“Kayla!” he shouted.  He hurled himself at the door and shoved his arm into the narrow space as it closed.  The safety caught and stopped it from closing on his arm.  He saw her through the aperture, shrunk up against the back corner of the small space tears streaming down her tired and devastated face. 

“No,” she sobbed, “Please just go!”  She turned away from him to face the corner.

“Baby, listen to me!” he gasped as the elevator bounced back open.  “Listen to me, please, you don’t know what you just saw in there.”  He entered the elevator and physically turned her around to face him as the door closed.  Kayla tried to wiggle out of his grasp, but he held fast and hit the stop button on the wall panel.

“Steve, please!”

“Don’t fight me, Sweetness—“

“DON’T CALL ME THAT!  DON’T CALL ME THAT EVER AGAIN!!!”

He wasn’t expecting her visceral reaction and flinched.  He had never heard that voice out of her before.  Not ever.  Not even when she found him with Ava … Steve felt his soul crushing as he remembered another terrible choice he’d gotten them into … By the time Kayla had found him at the hospital all those years ago, she’d had a few days to process it.  Now the pain was brand new.  Minutes old.  Raw.  The depth of her hurt – the extent of the damage he’d done this night – was even more than he’d ever imagined.  Experiencing it now, just in this short amount of time … it was far worse than he’d ever dreamed.

Steve felt very small as he looked upon her, his emotions overwhelming.  “Kayla, listen to me,” he said.  He didn’t know when he’d started crying, but his face was wet with tears.  “Let me explain, please, baby.”

“I don’t know what there is to explain,” she cried along with him.  “You were in bed with her. You were holding her.  Talking softly to her.  Touching her.”

“No!  No, that’s not how it was.”

“Do you think I’m stupid?” she spat.

“No.  No, of course not, it’s just you’re wrong about what you saw.”

“I know what I saw, Steve.” Her voice was shaky; he watched her struggle to stay in control.

“It was a trick, Kayla.  What you saw was a trick.  Marina just wanted to get me into her bed.”

“WELL IT WORKED!!!” she shrieked again.

“IT DIDN’T!  NOTHING HAPPENED!” he screamed back.  Kayla covered her face with both her hands as a knee-jerk reaction to his retort and backed up against the elevator wall.  Steve was stricken by her reaction.  God, Kayla, I can’t believe how badly I hurt you. “Jeez, I’m scaring you.  Again.”  His voice broke.  “Nothing happened, Kayla,” he repeated with far more sanity.  “You’ve gotta believe that!” 

“Why should I believe anything you say?” she cried.  “I just want to go home.  Let me go, please.”

“Please, baby,” He fell to his knees and laid his head against the small bump that was Stephanie growing inside of Kayla.  She tried to pull away, her arms out above him, refusing to touch him.  But she was exhausted and not strong enough to put up much of a fight, and he was burning high on adrenalin to hold her tight as he wept.  “I know things …,” he cried into her belly, “things about how things are gonna be.  We can’t waste any more time.  I need you and … I need you.  Please, just let me explain, baby.” Steve’s outpouring of emotion was getting to her despite herself.  “That’s all I wanna do, Kayla, that’s all I wanna do, please!  Please, let me put it right.  I’ve gotta put it right, you’ve gotta let me!  I love you, baby, please!  Please.”

The sudden sound of banging reverberated through the door and into the elevator shaft. 

“Listen, guys,” Jack’s voice sailed in to them.  “I’m sorry, but you need to move that to a room before they call the police.  I could hear you all the way back in Marina’s room!”

Kayla tried to push Steve off, but he wouldn’t budge.  He buried his face against Kayla’s stomach just above her baby bump and took strength from his baby.  Visions of his beautiful brunette daughter assailed him.  “Papa’s here,” he barely whispered so Kayla couldn’t hear the words.  “Papa’s putting it right Little Sweetness.” 

Steve finally released her and stood up.  When he looked at her he saw doubt in her eyes, but he also saw the smallest of openings.  She wants to believe me, he thought as he wiped his tears away with his palms.

“Come to my room, let me explain.”

Kayla scowled.  “Your room’s not her room?” she said with continued doubt.

“Of course it’s not.”  He tried not to raise his voice again. 

He took the elevator out of stop mode, and it re-opened on the same floor where they got in.  He held out his hand.  “Come with me.  Please.”

Jack stood against the door to keep it from closing and Steve jumped.  “Sorry!  I just – I just thought you should get out of there before you attracted unwanted attention.”  He gestured to Steve as if to say, and you should put on a shirt, but Steve’s state of dress was not foremost on his mind.

“I thought you were watching her, Jack!”

“I am!  I locked her in.”

“Her own room?  Brilliant!”

“No, the storage room.  Figured having her right next door was a bad idea.”

Steve let out a breath.  “Thanks,” and he clapped his brother on the shoulder.   Kayla’s reaction to this exchange was not positive.

“Go with him, Kayla.  No matter what happens … you’ve … you’ve got something you need to do,” Jack pleaded.

Apparently, this Kayla was not ready to relent, because she exited the elevator with Steve right on her heels and turned to Jack.  “Why are you doing this, Jack?  Just take me home, I want to go home.”

“I’m trying to keep you from making a big mistake,” he said looking at Steve.

“The only mistake I made was letting you convince me to come to Italy.”  She crossed her arms in front of her with stubborn resolve to leave.

Steve wondered how long he’d been there.  How long did he have before his Kayla jumped in.  He was upset that she wasn’t there, yet worried that she’d get there too soon.  He continued to watch the exchange between she and Jack and started getting frustrated at the time that was ticking away.

“Kayla, I think if you’d stop for a minute.  Calm down.  Think about this—“

“No.  I want to go home, Jack.”

“But you came here to see Steve.”

“Oh, I think I saw him,” she directed right at her husband, the pain lacing her words.

“Sweetness, I’m telling you—“

Kayla whipped around and slapped him hard across the face.  The sting against his cheek was nothing compared to the one that ripped through his heart.

“Don’t call me that, dammit,” Kayla seethed.

Steve reached up to adjust a patch that wasn’t there, then put his hand to the spot she’d just smacked and swallowed down his misery.

His brother looked at Steve with eyes that held such pity.  Somehow, Jack found his voice.  “I … don’t think we really saw what was happening in that room,” he offered weakly.

“Since when did you become Steve’s ally?”  Now she sounded like his advocate, and hope glimmered within him again.

None of them knew that Kayla and Jack had had almost this exact conversation the first time through, because the only one whose consciousness was repeating it wasn’t actually there at the time.  The computers in Rolf’s lab, however, somehow knew that this conversation happened before, because the numbers were in a strange sort of alignment that didn’t quite match up but were close enough for the scientist to take notice.  It wasn’t the first time this kind of impossible dichotomy shown in the numbers, and Rolf still didn’t know if it was good, bad, or indifferent.

“You were there with me Jack,” she continued, “what do you think was happening?”

“Let him tell you!  He’s right here! 

“I don’t want to see Steve now.”

“Kayla,” Steve was done pleading, his voice now demanding.

“No!” she spat at her husband.  Then she turned to Jack.  “I just wanna go home, and if you ever cared about me Jack, please, take me home.”  Kayla let out a sob.  “Please.”

“After everything you’ve been through – that—that – people – have put you through – to be together … don’t you owe him that?  Doesn’t he just deserve a chance?!”

Now Steve really noticed his brother for the first time.  He didn’t realize that Jack had worked so hard on his behalf back then.  His relationship with him in 2009 was strange. It had so many elements to it.  Right now he just appreciated him and hoped he’d gotten through to Kayla. 

“I’m done wasting time,” Steve huffed.  He then scooped up his wife under immense protest and carried her down the hall to his hotel room.  He didn’t look back, he didn’t glance into the open door of Marina’s empty room next door, and he took the abuse as Kayla tried to flail and wiggle out of his grasp.  Upon entering the room he kicked the door shut with a slam, then gently set her down on the foot of the bed that he’d, apparently, bolted out of when Marina screamed for him before his awareness had arrived there.

The color had returned to Kayla’s face, only now it was the red hue of anger.  She didn’t offer any further verbal protests, she was too exhausted.  Steve saw that she was and got right to the point.  He bent down on his knees in front of her, his tears at bay, and very solemnly started talking.

“Kayla, there is nothing about any of this that I did right.  The first thing you have to know is that I didn’t touch her just now.  I didn’t want her.  I was sitting on her bed because she screamed and said she had a bad dream.  It was just a trick, baby, she only wanted to get me in her bed.  As soon as I saw it for what it was I tried to get out of there, but she taunted you and made you think I was with her.  It’s not true.  I swear on my mother’s life, Kayla, it did not happen.  Now, I need you to believe that, baby. 

Kayla watched him with reservation.  But he could see her eyes soften.  He could see how badly she wanted to believe him.  He knew that she eventually would, but he needed this Kayla to believe him.  He needed her to not leave Italy thinking he wanted Marina.  He was very aware that his Kayla was still out there and on her way into this body, and his heart longed for her, especially now.  It was the most ironic sense he’d ever felt.  But looking into the very sad and shiny eyes that were so impossibly blue staring into his, this was his wife, too.

“Ok?”

“Go on,” she said softly.

“That’s my girl.” He exhaled heavily and reached out to caress her face, and the charge he felt when he touched her threatened to overwhelm him.  The fact that she let his fingers reach for her at all was a milestone, and it galvanized him.  “It doesn’t mean much, but I really did think she was dead.  Dead and gone for more than a decade.  And when I found out she wasn’t, I can’t tell you the panic.  All I could think to do was hide her from you, and if I did, then she’d stay dead.”

A tear rolled down Kayla’s cheek, and an awe came over him.  For the first time, he felt the fact that he’d literally gone back in time.  He was with his wife of 1989.  It wasn’t 2009 Kayla in there sharing this weird experience with him.  It was his wife of this time.  This was not a feeling he could identify.  It was special.  Exceptional.  It was a gift. 

Steve looked deeply into her eyes, and she looked back, listening to every word.  “The next thing I have to say is that I should have told you about her from the start.  I promised you honesty, and I held back this whole part of my life.  But, Swe …”  Kayla didn’t react, so he chanced it.  “Sweetness …”  After a pause he swallowed the lump in his throat and went on.  “It was just a small part.  I was only married to her for a few months, it was before I even met Bo, I was practically a kid.  When I thought she’d died in that bay out there, and I didn’t do more to try to find her, I was ashamed and have carried that with me.  I didn’t want you to think I could abandon someone I was supposed to love.”  Kayla looked away and closed her eyes at his reference to having loved her.  Steve saw her insecurity immediately and took care of it straight away.  “But I’m older now, Kayla, and someone taught me what real love is.  What being in real love actually feels like.  And I know now that what I felt for her was nothing more than lust and infatuation.  I never loved her with that kind of depth.  You are the only woman I’ve ever loved, Kayla.  I never even loved Britta the way I love you.”

Kayla let out a whimper, her eyes softening to him so much more than even before.  He was getting through to her.  My God he really was.  He was fixing this mess!

“It was wrong, baby.  It was all wrong.  I’m sorry,” he said breathily.  “All I can do is say I’m sorry and beg you to forgive me.  I love you, Sweetness, I love you so much.”  He took her hand and brought it to his lips.  “Please.  Say you believe me.” He looked at her expectantly, waiting for the words he was now praying for.

“Nothing happened?”

Steve shook his head.  “Not a thing.”

“You don’t love her?”

Steve’s eye blurred with tears.  “God, no.”

Kayla let out a wretched sob.  She reached for him and let herself fall into his lap on the floor against the bed.  She thrust her head into his neck as he held her in his lap and wept.  Each sob was releasing the pain, the anger, the betrayal she’d felt since the moment Marina had come into their lives.  It was incredible, he felt her literally let it all go as the sobs just flowed out of her like the loosening of a sieve.  That’s all it took, he realized. This one moment changed everything. 

“You forgive me, don’t you, Kayla?”  He asked hopefully, afraid to believe it. 

Kayla nodded and reached her hand up to her husband’s face.  “I’m sorry I hit you.  I’m so sorry, Steve.”

“Oh … Sweetness, forget it.  I deserved it.” 

She continued to cry and kissed the inflamed cheek she’d slapped.  A thrill ran through him when she did.  Then she gingerly lifted her head up and smiled.  He melted at the sight of it.  “Steve … You didn’t hear me when I went to the hangar before you left.”  Steve wasn’t sure what she was referring to.  “Before you took off, remember on the radio, the signal was breaking up?”

“Yeah, baby,” he said gently.

“I was trying to tell you something.” 

When she didn’t go on right away, he prompted her.  “What, Sweetness?”

In a very gentle and soft voice she said the words he’d never gotten to hear like a man is supposed to hear them.  “We’re going to have a baby.” 

Steve’s eyes misted over, and tears began anew.  “We are, are we?” he smiled through his tears.  “Really?”

Kayla nodded.  “I’m pregnant.”  She shrugged and wiped the tears away from his cheeks.  “You’re going to be a daddy.”  Then she took his hand and placed it on her abdomen just below her belly button as he continued to cradle her in his arms. 

“Thank you,” he said with heavy emotion.  “Thank you for this beautiful baby, Kayla.  I love you so much.” 

“I love you, too, Steve.”  She finally said it.  Steve’s heart wanted to burst.  “We both do.”

Before Steve knew what he was doing, he leaned down and swept her lips up into his and kissed her with every ounce of love he had in him.  When she kissed him back, he felt it like a memory.  His wife of so many stolen years ago was kissing him.  Telling him she was about to give him a baby.  And that she forgave him for the biggest mistake he’d ever made in his entire life.  He broke away and held her so closely that he could feel her heart beating. 

Then Kayla went rigid.  His stomach flipped with the knowledge that his wife was on her way.  How long had it been?  He’d lost track of time.  All he knew was that he fixed this place.  He fixed this.  And like a confirmation that he’d done the right thing here, Kayla had told him that she was pregnant.  Now he needed his wife before he exploded.  Steve looked Kayla’s blank face in the eyes, cradled her head in his hand and waited for her face to come alive.

Kayla arrived into the body Steve held in his lap and inhaled sharply.  The first thing she saw were Steve’s two eyes looking intensely into hers.  Her eyes rolled back into her head with jump sickness, and she felt his loving arms steady her as they waited for it to pass.  This act alone told her that this was him.

“Stockholm?” she asked weakly.

“Twenty questions,” Steve replied heavily.  Then he followed it up with, “Italy, actually.”

“We’re in Italy?”  Steve nodded.  He didn’t say anything more, he was too overcome with joy and just a little bit of guilt over having kissed his other Kayla.  Instead, he just looked into her eyes with something she couldn’t identify.  Two eyes, we’re in Italy, and Steve’s not talking.  She didn’t have a good feeling about this.  She looked around and saw that she was in Steve’s lap on the floor.  She didn’t remember being here at all.  What was going on?  “Marina?” she asked carefully.  Steve nodded again, then Kayla could see he was about to lose it.  “Steve, what is it?” she asked as she ran her soft fingers down his face.  Steve just shook his head.  He still hadn’t spoken another word.  She knew her husband well and could see that he was choked up.  What she didn’t know was why.  “Tell me, baby,” she encouraged him gently. 

Steve buried his face in her shoulder and cried.  All Kayla could do was hold him while he did.

Chapter Text

Find Me
46

Kayla felt her husband’s shoulders shake as she held him.  He felt so different.  He was bulkier, his chest was broader, his hair was so much shorter and blonder.  This was the Steve of right after his time as Daniel Lucas.  Marina, she thought with disdain.  Not only was this one of the last times she’d ever want to jump to, she knew how much it upset Steve.  That dream back at the Pioneer Village was enough to drive that home for her.

She tried to soothe him, but she was concerned about whatever must have just happened before she got there.  Clearly, he had jumped first so he arrived first, and it seemed that something had taken place before she got there that he had to find his way through without her.  Her mind raced as she held his head against her and whispered calming words.

The only time she’d been in Italy was when Jack had taken her there on his plane to tell Steve she was pregnant, just to find him holding Marina in bed.  Other than his death, it was the most painful thing she’d ever been through in her life.  She knew now that he hadn’t betrayed her.  Lied to her, yes, but his devotion to her and their marriage had never wavered.  It took her weeks to resolve it within herself enough to forgive him, but she eventually saw that what he did, while completely backwards and wrong, he did because of that devotion.  Now that she was back in Italy, she would do what she could to not let the memory of that pain affect her.  So far that wasn’t so hard, as Steve needed her.

It didn’t take long for Kayla’s mind to wander to really terrible possibilities as to what he maybe arrived into.  Had her 1989 self rejected him?  It was a distinct possibility.  She rationally recalled what happened on that trip.  She’d run away, back to the lobby, desperately tried to book a flight home while Jack pleaded with her to give Steve a chance.  Steve hadn’t known she was there then.  Did he do things differently this time?  Change things like he did with that reporter back at the Deveraux estate?  Maybe this time he’d followed her to the lobby.  How did she get into his hotel room?  Was this his hotel room?  Please don’t let this be her room.

After a minute, Steve calmed down and just nuzzled her neck and started kissing her face all over.  Lovingly, with the gentle lips of this man who loved her so much. 

Kayla lifted his face to look him in the eyes.  “Steve,” she smiled warmly at him then kissed his lips.  “Tell me … tell me.”

“Sweetness,” he rasped then exhaled.  He stroked her hair, not really noticing the wisps he was dislodging from her ponytail.  Kayla dried his cheeks with the pads of her thumbs.

“Is this when I saw you in bed with – I mean when I saw you sitting on Marina’s bed.  When I flew to Italy?”

Steve nodded.  “Baby … you just told me about Stephanie.  I don’t go home and hear it from Jack.  You just told me.”  He smiled.  “That we’re having a baby.  It was beautiful, Kayla.  You told me with this love in your eyes, and you put my hand on our beautiful baby.”

“I did?”  Her hand went to her belly and felt the firm bump.  A thrill coursed through her.  “I’m pregnant … I’m pregnant here!”

Steve smiled at the light in his wife’s eyes.  Where just moments ago there was darkness there was now light.  “How does it feel?”

“Incredible!” And it really was.  She did feel so special.  She felt that baby inside of her and let a tear slide down her face.  Her eyes were wide with such happiness, and Steve drank her in. “So, that was good, happy crying?  Just now?” she asked with some doubt, because it didn’t really seem that way.

Steve looked down at Kayla’s belly.  “Not really all of it, no.  I think it was relief.  And release.  Of all of it that just happened.  Before you jumped in.”

“So, something didn’t go right just now did it?  I mean, something changed if I told you I was pregnant, that didn’t happen last time, so that’s good.  But something went wrong?”

Steve reached up again to adjust his patch and just got eyebrow.  He clicked his tongue in frustration that he wasn’t going to have that nervous habit to rely on.  “I wouldn’t say that, either, actually.” Kayla’s expression turned confused.

“When I got here, she was in my – in my arms.  She’d just screamed my name, and I came running in, I guess, before I got here.”  Kayla was silent and didn’t react, letting him get it out.  “I knew right away it wasn’t you I was holding.  I could smell her.  Smell her perfume.  She felt cold.  I knew right away it was all wrong, baby, I did, I swear I did.”

“Shh, ok, it’s ok.  So, I wasn’t there yet …” she prompted. 

Steve nodded.  “Yeah, you weren’t, but this you was.” he sighed.  He was still cradling her in his lap.  He hadn’t let her go since the moment she’d arrived into this body.  He needed to feel her warm in his arms.  “You’d seen the whole thing from the doorway.  I hadn’t seen you there last time.”  His face twisted into a pained expression.  “The look on your face, Sweetness,” his voice broke.  “God, Kayla, I hurt you so bad.  I hurt you so bad, baby.”

“Shh.”

“I’m sorry, Kayla,” he tried but failed not to cry again.

“We already did this, you don’t have to keep saying you’re sorry, I know you are, and I forgive you,” she implored him.  She could feel how crushed he was.  “Already forgave you!  Stop beating yourself up.  Please.”

“You didn’t see your face!  You didn’t see—“

“Steve, I think I know how I felt, I was living it.”

“Well, I didn’t.  I didn’t get to see any of that.  ‘Til now.  I almost can’t face you.”

Kayla took his face in her hands and forced him to look right at her.  “Silly man,” she said.  She kissed where his scar used to be and noticed how red his cheek was, then asked with dawning concern.  “Did you … have an argument … with the other me?”

Steve let out an anxious laugh.  “’The other me.’  That sure does explain it.  Yeah, you could say that.”  Steve then just let it all out, the whole play-by-play.  He told her the whole thing from Marina trying to kiss him to finally managing to make her 1989 self see the truth before pouring his heart out with apologies.

Kayla heard every word he said, but her eye kept going to the left side of his face; it was inflamed.  She reached up and caressed it very gently with her fingertips.  “I slapped you, didn’t I?”  Steve didn’t say anything.  “I can see that I did.”  Steve didn’t want to confirm her statement because he’d put her through enough.  Yet, here she was, once again, forgiving him and feeling bad for her own actions when it was him that had done wrong. 

“Sweetness … that slap didn’t hurt me, it was why you slapped me that tore me up inside.”

“I’m so sorry.”

“You have nothing to be sorry for, Kayla.”

Kayla took a deep breath and put her finger to his lips.  “I can’t tell you how I would have reacted if Italy went differently, like the way you’re describing.”

“Well, I think I can,” Steve chuckled.

“But try to remember that I was feeling like our marriage was over.  Like you really did love her more than me, after all.  I don’t think my emotional state was that stable.  But it’s no excuse for not telling you about Stephanie.”

now you did.”

Kayla was tiring and shifted position a bit.  “Aren’t your arms tired, why don’t I move –”

“No,” he brought her in for another kiss.  “I want to keep holding you if that’s ok.”  Kayla nodded and felt his powerful body hold her possessively and loved it.

Steve finished telling her the rest and then swallowed his fear for the final part of this.  “Kayla I kissed her.  You.  I …”  He let out a ragged breath, and Kayla could feel his heart beat fast.  “I just couldn’t help it, baby.  After this whole situation and that you forgave me and told me about Stephanie I had such a … I was so emotional.  Inside.  I had to let it out.  I had to kiss you.  To show you how I felt.  I … I feel like that was maybe wrong.”

Kayla cocked her head and smiled.  “I’ve never actually thought about it,” she said.  But I don’t know how I could really get mad, I mean it is me.”

Steve looked up thoughtfully.  “Is it?  I don’t know.”

“Steve, it’s ok,” she said again, thinking it through,” it’s me.  That girl you jump to is still me. It’s not like some alternate reality where we were never together, I mean … she is me.

“Ok,” he relented.  Then he looked into her eyes and very quietly said, “I’m sorry, Sweetness.  I’m so sorry.”  Kayla let him apologize again.  “For everything I did wrong during this time in our lives.”  This time he was apologizing to her as they were now, in 2009.

“I’m sorry, too,” now she was the one who was crying.  “For not telling you about the baby right away.  As soon as I found out.  The first chance I had.  And all those chances after that that I didn’t.  I’m sorry, too, Steve.”

Steve ran his thumb over her bottom lip.  She still looked so worn down.  Drawn.  This body needed rest desperately. 

“Do you forgive me, too?” she asked.

Steve nodded.  “Yeah,” he smiled. “I love you.”  Then he saw her wedding ring glinting on her finger and felt a peace wash through him.  He took her hand and put it against his heart.  “Love you,” he repeated.

“We love each other,” she replied gently.  “This is over now.  It’s just you and me.”  Steve nodded and held her against him.

An hour later Kayla lay sleeping in the bed in her underwear and bra with her little baby bump protruding just below her navel.  Steve sat at the small table and thought about where they needed to go from here, who was where and what the timing was.  Victor Kiriakis had threatened Kayla if he didn’t find that key, and the man had proven to be good on his word.  But it was going to be months before that actually happened.  There was nothing really stopping him from leaving without diving into the bay and getting the thing.  Only Marina and her manipulations.  So, no, then, no reason not to go home right away.  Kayla stirred, and Steve watched as she rolled over onto her side.  She really had been exhausted.  It was another example of a consciousness that was wide awake or healthy or otherwise normal being affected by the condition of the body they were now inhabiting.  And this body was spent.  The dark circles under her eyes concerned Steve.  He hadn’t seen those the first time, because it had been days later that he’d seen her in the hospital back in Salem.  He was struck by the reality of what his actions had done to her and tried to remember that they were past this now in 2009 and that he had to just figure a way out of this jump.  He climbed into bed with her and fell asleep with his hand on Kayla’s belly.

At 2am Steve was awakened by a knock at the door.  Kayla’s eyes flew open, and she was panicked for a moment, completely disoriented.  “Baby, you’re ok!  It’s ok.”

“Steve!”  It all came back to her.  “Sorry.”  The knock sounded again.  “Do you think it’s Marina?” she asked.

“No, I don’t think so.” He said.  Sure enough when he opened the door Jack was standing there looking sheepish and completely uncomfortable. 

“Hey Jackson,” Steve said, keeping him on that side of the door.  Kayla pulled up the covers and called to Steve in warning.  She didn’t want him in that room.

Jack looked down, knowing she probably wasn’t dressed.  “I’m sorry, I’m not asking to come in.  I’m just, well, I don’t know what you want me to do with Marina.  She’s not going to hold in there much longer. I waited as long as I could, Steve.  I … I …”

“You got a plane here, don’t you?”

“Yes.  You – you want me to take you home?  I can do that!”

“Yeah, we need to get out of here.”

“Wait, you found the key?”

“No, it’s still down there in the bottom of the bay.  I’m not going through that again, let her hire someone.  You wanna know the secret, I’ll tell you, Isabella is Victor’s daughter.  There, secret’s out, no need for the key.  Now that you know, I need you to get us out of here.”

Jack stood there with his mouth hanging open.  “Victor is whose father?”

“Steve, let him in.”  He turned around to see that Kayla had dressed.  “I think you should get out of the hallway.”  Steve pulled Jack in and closed the door.  

“Listen, Jack, don’t ask any questions.  Just trust me.”

“I do, Steve, I do trust you!” Jack said with the strangest look on his face that Steve couldn’t really identify.  It was almost like pride.  Strangely enthusiastic pride.

“Can ya gas that sucker up and get us out of here?  Tonight?  Because if I have to keep up this bullshit with the key it’s not going to end well for this pretty face of mine.”

“Steve, are you forgetting something.  None of this is going to matter when we jump.”  Kayla saw the way Jack was paying very good attention and knowing that he was missing something in this conversation, but she didn’t care.  “Is there really a point?  These changes are not going to stick for us.”

“No!  Kayla I just fixed it … this one is gonna stick!”

“Steve.”  She tipped her head a bit and gently took his hand.  “None of it sticks.”

“How do you know that?  How do you know that maybe putting it right really is the answer, and now we just keep livin’?”

“Without Joey?” she asked softly.

“Ok, first whosewhatsits, and now this Joey guy.  Who’s Joey?” Jack piped in.

“Well, BillyJack,” Steve replied while still looking at Kayla.  “He’s gonna be your nephew in about 20 years.”

Jack took a moment then said, “Huh?”

“Sweetness, I don’t care if it’s gonna stick or not, I just don’t want to have to be here another minute.  We know how to get around all this now, so let’s just go home.  Because the one thing I’m not doing, and I mean I’m not doing it, Kayla, is letting that woman near us ever again. I don’t want her next door to us, let’s just go home.  You can take us home, right, Jack?  Tonight?”

“This morning, you mean.”

“Whatever.”

“Yeah, we can leave anytime you want, but what’s all this ‘again’ stuff and mumbo jumbo you’re talking about?”

“Nothing gets by him, Sweetness.”

“I was wondering what you were thinking,” Kayla answered with a roll of her eyes.

“I can’t let her near us, baby.”

“Ok, then let’s go home.  I do want to get out of here, so you don’t have to convince me.  I just want you to not try so hard.”  Then she whispered, “We know what’s going to happen, so we know what to do now. We’ll be ok.”

“Don’t worry about the mumbo jumbo, Jack.  It’s like secret married talk.”

Jack was not convinced, and Steve knew it, but he was so happy to be able to help them he didn’t care.  “Ok, so what’s the plan?” he asked his brother.

“How fast can you arrange for the plane?”

“They’re on standby, I’ll arrange for it right now.”

“Have you slept, Jack?” Kayla interjected. 

Jack softened when he looked at her, and her heart reached out to him a bit.  She knew he was trying so hard here to be a better person.  In about a year he’d be apologizing to her in the garden of Lawrence Alamain’s estate.  She’d never forget that day for as long as she lived, nor would she forget the day he raped her.  It lived on in her, the pain diminishing every year more and more but never having entirely disappeared.  Jack was a changed man now, and she forgave him … mostly.  And here she saw the beginnings of his hard-fought road to redemption.  He was touched that she asked, she could see that. 

“Have you?”

“Oh, you know me,” he said awkwardly.  “Reporters don’t have time for such things as sleep.  Especially when the flight will be long enough for me to get plenty of shuteye if we’re really going to be taking off when Steve here says we are?”

“We are.  Get her ready, we’ll meet you at the airfield in an hour. 

Jack disappeared to get the plane ready and, Steve assumed, free Marina.  As soon as the door was closed behind him Steve got his bag out and threw his clothes into it.  Kayla got his toiletries from the bathroom and dumped them in there.  As Steve zipped his bag Kayla let out a nervous laugh.

“What?” Steve asked.

“We just had a lazy day at home at the loft.  I mean it was just two days ago.  And now we’re here in Italy on the run again.” 

“I know, I want to go home, too.”

“Do you think we’ll ever see it again?  We just keep jumping from one part of our lives to another to the next.  I don’t think it was to fix anything, because we’ve jumped places that needed no fixing.  So, that’s not it.  I just know in my bones we’re going to jump again.”  Steve knew she was right.  “It’s all so pointless.  I just want this to end,” she said sadly.

Steve got back down on his knees and lifted Kayla’s white shirt and lowered her waistband to reveal his growing baby.  He rubbed his hands lovingly over the small bump, kissed it, then spoke right to her belly like the baby was all ears.  “Papa’s going to be going soon.”  Kayla wrapped her fingers gently in his hair.  “I don’t know when, but I want you to know how much I love you.  Your mama and me love you more than anything, and whatever happens after we go, you just know that we’re going to be so proud of you.  We’re going to love you so much, just like we do now.  It’s not that we don’t want to stay here with you and be with you.  We can’t help it.  But we love you, ok, Little Sweetness?”  Steve kissed Kayla’s belly again as a tear fell from her eye into Steve’s hair.

Steve stood back up, and Kayla threw her arms around him as she laid her head on his chest.  He kissed his wife tenderly.  Their kisses were soft and gentle and so comforting.  He didn’t want to stop kissing her, he wanted to stand there in that room and kiss her forever.  But his need to get out before he had to ever look that woman in the eyes again drove him.  Just a few more kisses first …

It was then that the strong and jarring feeling came over him that he’d felt so many times before that he’d lost count.  He didn’t know if he felt relief or anger.  Maybe it was both.  What he did know was that he was going to be jumping first again, because Kayla wasn’t the least bit rigid.  Kayla sensed a change in him, however, and opened her eyes then pulled back.  She knew as soon as she looked into his eyes.  Two eyes.

“I’m sorry, baby.  Time for me to go,” he said as the room had just started its slow spin.

Kayla nodded sadly.  “I’ll be right behind you.”

“I’m never going to hurt you again, Kayla.  Never.”  She ran her thumb over his left cheek where his scar used to be.  “Kiss me,” Steve said.

She did.  Then Kayla literally felt him leave his body as the jump took him.  Kayla released his lips, closed her eyes, and waited the ten seconds it would take to follow, just like every other jump since Cleveland.  Then with her last thoughts being on her baby girl growing inside of her with her hand protectively covering her belly, she jumped, too.

Chapter Text

Find Me
Chapter 47

 Steve arrived to a body that was miles apart from the one he’d just left.  This body was, for one thing, starving.  For another, he felt the effects of some kind of sedative in his system.  Whatever that drug was, it did not play nicely with the jump effect, and for the first time since these jumps began he could not control his nausea and threw up on arrival.  He sat bolt upright from the prone position this body had been in, leaned over and let go with regret, hoping no one was in his crossfire.  With no food in his stomach, it was nothing more than dry heaves, but his stomach muscles contracted violently, reacting to the mix of vertigo and sedative.  And something else, too … the unmistakable feeling of buoyancy.  He was on a boat.

Steve groaned and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand.  “Kayla!” he yelled.

Immediately a narrow door to his left swung open, and he got a look at where he was for the first time.  It was a bare room save for the cot he’d been laying on.  Maybe 8x10 with a tiny door in the corner that he assumed was attached to a head.  And what’s more, Steve didn’t recognize it at all.  He’d been on plenty of boats, but this wasn’t any of the rooms on any of the boats he remembered.  Where the hell am I?  Where’s Kayla? 

A huge man walked in through the metal door and fixed him with a look of reproach.  “You tryin’ to get yourself more of that super Nyquil, Johnson?”  The man’s voice completely bellied his threatening exterior in both tone and inflection.  “Seriously, man, I can only do so much, here!  Dreaming in the dead of night is one thing, but screaming her name in broad daylight like that?  Today of all days?  Are you mental?!”  The man was letting him have it in a scolding whisper.  “Now, stop with that Kayla shit or they’ll make me force it down your throat, ok?”  Steve just stared, desperately trying to place him but failing.  The man who looked like he was built out of a brick wall but spoke like he was a harmless Kindergarten teacher gave him a weird look back.  “What?”

“N-Nothing.”  Steve was stumped, afraid to say the wrong thing.  He couldn’t imagine where this was and who was holding him captive … on a boat.

“Then stop looking at me like ya just seen ghost, huh?  Fuck, man, Jeez!”

“Sorry.”  He tried to sound as neutral as possible, but a cold fear ran down Steve’s spine as a possibility occurred to him.  There were whole chunks of his memory that had not come back. There was nothing about his life before he’d been taken that he didn’t remember, but all that time from his supposed death until he became DiMera’s soldier was a complete blank.  Never did come back.  He remembered bits and pieces of working for DiMera, and he remembered all of his time as Nick Stockton.  But that time while he was still with Alamain?  There were flashes and images that amounted to a whole lot of nothing; he recalled them more like states of mind than anything else.  So, for all intents and purposes, that time is his memory was simply missing.  Gone.  Steve carefully adjusted his patch, which was there, and ran his hand through his hair, which, apparently, had been cut short.  He subtly scratched his left cheek and noted no scar.  He realized with dread that this was definitely the time after he’d “died.”  That meant he was flying blind; no memory of how anything went the first time, how he was supposed to act, or where exactly he was.

Just then another man entered.   Maybe 50, short, brown, receding hairline, nothing remarkable about him.  “So, how’s our patient, Tiny?” he asked with an even nature.

“Just fine.  No issues.”

“Really?  Then why’s he looking right at me?”  Then he crossed his arms and looked down upon Steve.  “Tell me, do you know your name?”

Steve was wary and had no idea what his best course of action was, telling the truth or faking it.  “Steven Johnson,” he said calmly.  “Yours?”

“Ah,” he replied.  Then he turned to the guard.  “See the problem?  If he doesn’t eat, no meds.  If there are no meds, we can’t achieve our goal.  That won’t do, will it, Tiny?”

“Sorry, Dr. Hopkins, but he knows the stuff is in there and won’t eat.”

“Yes, well you need to do a little something about that.”

“Yes, sir.”

“You going to be a good patient for us, Mr. Johnson?”

“More like your prisoner,” he replied.  Where is Kayla right now?  I don’t even know where she is.  Did she sell the house yet?  Steve wanted to take in more of his surroundings, but he didn’t take his eye off the doctor.

The guard named Tiny shook his head behind the doctor and mouthed what are you doing?

“Mr. Johnson, Mr. Alamain’s tried to make you his guest, but all you do is fight us.  Lucky for me, you’re going to be somebody else’s problem very shortly.  Now, you eat this sandwich or we’ll put the manacles back on and go back to shoving it down that throat of yours.”

Dr. Hopkins looked away toward Tiny, and Steve took that opportunity to inventory the room, try to figure out the best way to the deck.  He had to get out of here.  He’d never been good in captivity.  But being on the water gave him some hope; the man knew his way around a boat.

“Tiny, we’re making the switch as soon as his new owners arrive. They’re about two hours out,” Dr. Hopkins said as he handed a vial to the guard.  “Until then, get this in him or it’ll make the transfer that much more painful for you.  Better to control him.”

“Right,” Tiny said.

New owners … Dimera.  Kayla thinks I’m dead.  My whole family thinks I’m dead.  Steve’s mind raced.

Just then another guard entered and handed Dr. Hopkins a cell phone, the likes of which could only be described as a brick.   Steve had seen laptops smaller than this industrial, beige thing with the huge plastic-coated, built-in antenna.  It struck him so funny he started laughing.  Dr. Hopkins, having no clue what was so funny, shot Tiny an insulted yet commanding look that resulted in the huge guard meeting Steve’s face with a right cross that made him see stars and dislodged his patch from its normal resting spot. 

Steve fell backwards onto the cot.  He groaned and tears from the pure searing pain rimmed his eye.  He cradled his jaw, righted his patch, and said, “great.”

“Sorry, Johnson,” Tiny barely whispered to him.  “I always pull my punches with you, but I think I really felt the crack that time.”

“You wanna make it up to me,” Steve whispered, get me out of here.”

Tiny frowned.  “I didn’t hear that,” then he turned and stood in the corner while Hopkins took whatever call this was.

“Is he lucid,” Steve could hear the voice tinny but clear on the other end of the phone.

“Yes, sir, I’m sorry.”

“Just stick the needle in him and be done with it.”

“It’s not that easy, Mr. Alamain” 

Alamain.  Still Alamain.  How long have I been gone?

“The patient needs to ingest it for the full effect, and he’s been on a veritable hunger strike. We’ve got enough in him to be tired, but I’m sorry, he definitely knows who he is and who he’s with.  But he’s responding to a lower dosage, so that‘s good news for tonight’s exchange.”

“Very well,” the voice said.  “Is the warehouse clean?”

“Cleaners finished the job before we left.”

“Good.  Get him transferred, then get out of Salem.”

Salem!  I’m home?  It was better than he’d hoped for. 

“Donovan and Johnson’s widow are getting too close with that lab of theirs, and, unfortunately, I have to deal with these ridiculous rape charges, so I cannot be there for it myself.  Don’t mess this up.”

The reference to Kayla made his heart skip a beat, and the word rape did nothing to ease his anxiety.  What had Kayla told him about what happened to Alamain after they took him?  He knew the answers but couldn’t call them up, his mind was in chaos not knowing the first thing about when he was.  Steve had to get out of there.  He formed a plan in his head and tested as many scenarios as he could in the short time he had.  If he was in Salem somewhere on the river, he was going to have to swim for it.

Dr. Hopkins ended the call and handed it back to the second guard, who left abruptly.  He gave some final orders to Tiny regarding Steve’s proper care and feeding, then left without another word to his prisoner.  When they were alone again, Tiny turned to Steve.

“Gonna miss our talks,” Tiny said.  “Ya know, when you was talking.”  Then he brought out a Baby Ruth from his inside pocket.  “Here.  One for the road now that I don’t have to save you from your starvation diet, anymore, either.”

“Starvation diet?”

“Yeah, I’m amazed you lasted as long as you did on the candy bars and beef jerky,” he laughed softly.  “Thanks for not ratting me out.  Then again, if you did you wouldn’t eat, wouldja!”  The guard laughed like he’d just heard the funniest joke in the world.

Steve tried to piece it all together as he eyed the completely uneaten food sitting on a tray against the wall next to him.  Hopkins … Hopkins … the name rang a bell.  Simon Hopkins?  No, he was dead, completely different guy.  But he’d said something about the food being drugged and Steve refusing to eat it.  Looks like the guard had taken pity on his prisoner and snuck him in some food.

“Tiny, tell me somethin’,” Steve said, his head clearing more each minute.  “Why you so nice to me?”

“I like ya, Johnson!  You listen to my stories, helped me with the car trouble … you know I’m terrible with cars.”

Why the hell’d I help him?  Did I go all Stockholm Syndrome or something?   “Yeah, right, I remember,” Steve lied.  “So, I got sold, huh?”

“You know you did.  This is our last day.  Good luck, hope your new life works out for ya.  Gonna miss that old warehouse.”

Warehouse … Steve filed that away.

“Tiny, since this is it for us, I have a couple questions.  Think you could just humor me?  Old time’s sake?”

Tiny opened the door a crack and looked outside, then closed it back up.  “Ok,” he said grudgingly, but make ‘em fast, I’ve gotta get this vial tossed overboard.  Unless you want it?”

“No, thanks,” he said with the same good humor that the suspected the guard had intended as he opened up the Baby Ruth.  “What year is it?”

“Well, I’m here to tell ‘em, that drug works at least a little,” Tiny muttered.  Then to Steve he said, “1991.  “Remember?”

“Right, right,” Steve said. 

“Been seven months, that’s a long assignment for me.  But after you kicked out the first guy’s teeth, ya know, they needed me to keep you in line.”

Steve was absorbing it all like a sponge.  “Yeah, that was something back in … Jeez, when was that, now …?”

“October, man, you weren’t even out of that hospital basement yet.  They had you gagged and tied down to the gurney by the time they assigned me to you.  The boss, he wouldn’t let ‘em kill you, so I got to hear a lot of Kayla, Kayla, Kayla for a while.  And you know how Hopkins feels about that. Y ou was supposed to be forgettin’, ya know.  Thought Alamain was gonna blow his top when he seen how you wasn’t all zombiefied.”  Then the huge man held his arms out and groaned in a mummy imitation.  “Good thing, too, or I’d’a never figured they was the spark plugs,” he laughed.  “Anyways, then it was off to the warehouse to prep you for the new owner, but then there was all those problems and he kept delaying.  It was so weird.”

“My memory is going, how many problems was that?  Two …”

“Two?!  At least five.  He had the wedding, the fake earthquake, then that thing with his dad, then he had to come here and fix it all.  Now with the latest thing, I’m surprised he’s doing the exchange, but best to just get it done, I suppose.”

Steve was perplexed. He had a ton of new information, but not a lot to glean from it that would get him out of there.  So, he went for broke.

“Tiny, if you like me so much, why haven’t you ever just let me go?  It would have saved you on candy bars, at least,” he said swallowing the last of it.”

“Boss would kill me.  You know that.”

“Not if I overpowered you.”  Tiny gave him a look that said, Really?  Come on.  “Look, I could have hit you over the head.”

Tiny didn’t really like where this was going.  “Don’t make it any harder, Johnson.  And don’t think I’m gonna look the other way, I need the paycheck with the baby comin’.”

“What about my baby?!  I haven’t seen her in ... man, she’s over a year old. I missed her birthday.”  Steve was still playing Tiny, but this bit was genuine.

“Look, it’s outta my hands,” he said with regret, but also a healthy dose of finality.  Tiny may have felt sorry for him and fed him, but he was not going to be turning any cheeks.  Steve was on his own, knowing he’d have to swim ashore and hope to God he wasn’t found. 

Kayla … Stephanie.  Gotta get to my girls.

Steve’s jaw was hurting from the power packed into Tiny’s blow.  He rubbed it with his hand, and Tiny apologized for the punch again.  “Don’t make ‘em mad over there.  They’re a lot meaner.”  The hairs raised on the back of Steve’s neck.  That he remembered.  “Good luck, Johnson.”  Then Tiny turned and walked out.

Steve shot up and tested his bearings.  He felt pretty good other than the jaw.  He went into the head and saw it was devoid of anything but a toilet and sink. No mirror, no toothbrush, nothing that could be used as a weapon.  The only loose items at all were the cot, the tray, and the items on the tray.  Not so much as a plastic fork.  He ran his hands through his hair again, and it felt really weird.  “That’s some short hair, dude,” he said to himself.  “Probably trying to hide you.”  He picked up the tray, ready to wield it if necessary, then listened at the door.  The coast seemed clear.  He reached for the doorknob, and that’s when he saw his wrists. They were scarred with rope burns.  The reality of what had happened to him hit him like a ton of bricks.  On a hunch he lifted the jeans he wore and saw that his ankles were the same.  Taking a cursory look at the rest of his body, it seemed fine, but those rope burn scars were serious, and they were telling.  He wanted to scream, but he didn’t have the time.

Steve opened the door, poked his head out, and could tell immediately that this was a large fishing boat.  Larger than Shawn Brady’s, but not as big as a yacht.  He knew boats like this well and knew exactly where to go.  The air was warm, and the sun was shining on a beautiful day.  Steve shoved the tray into the back of his jeans and headed for the rail.

Just as he was thinking this was way too easy, the second guard who’d brought the ancient cell phone rounded the corner fast and ran into him.  They stared at each other frozen in shock for a moment.  The guard made the first move and had a taser in his hand so fast it made Steve’s head spin.  Steve’s reactions were slow, but he still reached for the tray quicker than the taser could meet him and smacked the guard with such force over the head that he broke the skin on his forehead.  Steve absently registered that it takes a lot of rage to open up a gash on someone’s head with a smooth tray, but he didn’t feel bad in the least.  He’d been held for seven months, and his girls thought he was dead.  “I’m gonna set this right, too, asshole,” he whispered to the quickly passing out guard.  But before he hit the deck, Steve grabbed him by the arm holding the taser and shoved it into him, then stepped back.  The man shook with electrical charge and fell to the ground.  Steve looked around frantically.  No one presented themselves, so he pushed the incapacitated guard to the edge and dragged him overboard.  He needed to get rid of any evidence, give him the best chance to make it to the docks.

It wasn’t till he looked up that he saw that it wasn’t going to be too much of a problem, as the closest one was easily swimmable.  He also saw Tiny and Dr. Hopkins at the other end of the boat with their backs to him.  Without another moment of thought, Steve took another quick look back and forth, then dove into the river and swam like he’d never swam before.

Despite being sure they would be immediately after him, he made it to the pier in one piece.  He smiled as he realized that not only did he make it to relative safety, but this was near where they got married.  Unfortunately, it took him triple the time it should have.  This body was damaged, no question about it.  Malnourished, so hungry even right now, too thin, and deprived of exercise and sunlight for more than half a year.  Yet other than the scars at his wrists and ankles he seemed ok on the outside. 

He gasped for air and anxiously adjusted his patch every other minute, the only coping mechanism he had at the moment.  He held on to the slimy pylon of the pier and had no choice but to let himself bob up and down in the water while he caught his breath.  The emotions roiling in him were all over the map.  Anger, fear, worry, and utter disorientation with no frame of reference for this time.  He had to find his Kayla.  He’d just been holding her in Italy, and despite the terrible and emotionally draining experience of that one, he was a happy man when he jumped.  He’d fixed a terrible mistake, Kayla had told him she was pregnant, and his Kayla had arrived with her arms around him.  Now he was in a tortured body that could barely swim 70 yards without passing out. 

The sounds of distant shouting spurned him on.  He had no idea if it was Alamain’s boat or some random set of people on the pier, but it was enough to get him out of the water.

He found a ladder and hoisted himself with great difficulty out of the river.  He then proceeded to hide under the boards to take stock and figure out how to get home.  He knew his apartment couldn’t be home base in this time, and he made a mental note to talk to Kayla about finding different home bases for the right timeframes.  

He was at a bit of a loss as to where to go.  Everyone in this time thought he was dead.  He had no idea where Kayla would be right now.  The fish market was so close, he considered going there, but he was afraid he’d scare the living daylights out of the Brady’s.  He also thought about going to the Emergency Center, but he didn’t know for sure exactly what month this was, and remembering what she told him about how long she was still there was spotty at best.  He thought about going a lot of places; Marcus’s house, Shane’s house, the cop shop … but what he really wanted to was to go home.  His house.  That’s what he wanted.  But he thought Kayla had sold the house by now.  Steve’s mind was reeling; it was the first time he had no idea where he belonged.  He finally decided to go to the Emergency Center and hope and pray that Kayla or Marcus were there and that Kayla had jumped into herself by now.  If she hadn’t, it was going to be quite a shock for her. 

Steve was getting cold, so he rolled up the wet sleeves of the denim shirt, then went to slick back his hair and realized he didn’t need to do that with this short cut.  He was in the trendy area of the riverfront that had been built up recently just on the edge of the shipping district.  He knew it wouldn’t take long to get to the Emergency Center, so he took another few minutes to make sure no one had followed him.  Then when he felt as confident as he was going to feel, he started walking. 

It didn’t take long for him to hear it.  Laughter.  He knew the sound of that laughter, it belonged to Kayla, and it sailed to his ears like the voice of an angel.  It had been at least an hour since he’d arrived in this body, maybe more, he’d lost track of real time.  But he could tell that her voice was strong and confident.  This Kayla was not winging it.  He whipped around looking for the source of it.  Finally, he saw her about 20 yards away.  She looked so different; he almost didn’t recognize her with her short hair.  His friend, and brother-in-law, Shane, was there, too.  Upon seeing them lean against the side of one of the buildings, a relief washed through him that was indescribable.  Seeing them was like panicking that you got on the wrong plane, then realizing you’re on the right flight, after all.  His eyes rested on Kayla talking animatedly to Shane.  He’d never seen her this way.  He didn’t know these clothes, even her makeup was different.  She was so pretty in her white blouse with lace on the bottom. 

Steve resisted the urge to run to her.  This was 1991 Kayla, and he knew that if he just appeared to her that she might pass out like she did at the cemetery.  No instead he’d wait for her to arrive.  Until then he watched.

As he carefully covered some of the distance toward them to get a better view, it struck him that Kayla looked … not unhappy, and he felt a little guilty for thinking it.  He’d been gone for seven months, and he just assumed from what she’d told him that she would have still been shut off from people, simply going through the motions that were necessary to keep she and Stephanie going.  He wanted to go to her, but his Kayla wasn’t there yet, so he held back and just watched for a moment as she and Shane headed to a bench.  He saw them start to put on the roller skates as they shared a good-natured conversation.

“Oh yeah, at your ripe old age you wouldn't want to try anything new,” Kayla said with a smirk.  Then she let out an “Ooh,” as she sat down that reminded Steve of how bubbly his wife really was.

“Age has nothing to do with it,” Shane replied.

Steve was surprised that the two of them were socializing, as they weren’t on the same friendly level that, say, she and Marcus were.  A thought tried to weed up to him that he subconsciously refused to allow to grow.  He watched them continue the witty banter, and the tone of the conversation turned to something that made him very uncomfortable. 

“Will you leave me alone?” Shane said in mock annoyance.

“Are you kidding, I can't wait to see that incredible muscle tone, balance, and what was that other thing?  Oh right, muscle tone,” she teased.

“Yeah.” Shane took the ribbing, and Kayla laughed.  Steve didn’t like it.

“Oh no,” she said.

“Oh, what now?”

“Knots.”  Was she flirting?

“Knots?”

“The laces are full of knots.”

“Let me have a look.”  When Shane reached over and patted the outside of her upper thigh to encourage her to lift her leg onto his lap, Steve’s blood pressure flew to a heightened level.  It only got worse when she swung her leg up to comply.  He’s touching her.

As Shane got the knot out, Steve saw his wife look upon this man that he considered one of his closest friends with sweet eyes then tousle his hair.  Steve’s heart was beating so fast he could feel it in his throat.  The next thing that happened defied explanation.  Shane leaned back over his shoulder to look at Kayla with eyes that clearly loved her as more than his sister-in-law, then she leaned into him and kissed him.  She kissed him.  A deep, probing kiss that only those with some kind of feelings for each other give.  Steve leaned against the wood paneling of the building he was standing next to and felt his hand ball itself into a fist as Kayla broke the kiss and gave a contented little sigh. 

“You know,” Shane said, “I think this just might be quite fun after all.”  Then he turned and kissed her again. 

Steve had never seen so much fire.  It was the proverbial train wreck that he couldn’t look away from.  That man was kissing his wife.  His brother-in-law … his friend … was kissing his wife.  And suddenly the puzzle pieces that had begun to show themselves back at the Loft fell into place to form a complete picture.  It was Shane.  Shane Donovan was name of the man that she’d tried and failed to move on with.  The name she’d kept from him.  Well from what he saw, she wasn’t trying that hard.  From what he saw, she was pretty content, licking her lips of his kiss, taking his tongue in her mouth, letting his hand slide up and down her leg, sighing in satisfaction.  Steve felt sick.  Never had he wanted to jump so desperately as he did right now.  A kick in the gut would have been preferable to the pain that was searing its way through him.  Jealousy, hatred, hurt … betrayal.  He hadn’t been dead to her for a year, and already she had found someone else, that someone was Shane, her sister’s husband, and the worst of it, she’d kept it from him. 

How?  How could a love like theirs be so easily overcome?  How could it be done so quickly?   How could it be with Shane?  And how could she have not told him for the three years since he’d come back?

Steve had fallen through a rabbit hole so dark and so deep that he was positively consumed in black.

He didn’t know his legs had begun to move when Steve found himself slowly making his way toward them.  His body was on autopilot, the rage building within him.  The fact that Lawrence Alamain’s men were surely on the hunt for him was the furthest thing from his mind as Kayla and Shane stood up hand in hand.

It was Shane who saw Steve first.  Kayla was facing Shane and putting a steadying hand on him when she saw the look of shock register on his face.  “What is it,” she asked him with a giggle, “the wheels on your feet too much for ya there?”  When Shane didn’t answer, she realized that he’d become deeply affected by something he was seeing over her shoulder. 

“Steve?” Shane said incredulously.  Kayla lost her good humor immediately and frowned.  “My God, Steve!”

Steve was sure that he actually saw the shiver that ran down Kayla’s spine.  She turned around on the skates, and when her eyes found him, she took a quick intake of breath.  If he didn’t know better, he’d think his Kayla was arriving, but he knew that was not the case.  Her eyes were wide with shock, and he watched them instantly fill with tears.

She spoke as he looked upon Shane; he couldn’t look at her.  “Am I dreaming?” she asked shakily.  “Am I dreaming?  Or am I dead, too?”

Shane couldn’t believe the sight before him.  “I think we’re all very much alive, Kayla,” Shane assured her.  He had a wary tone to his voice; it didn’t escape him that Steve hadn’t taken his very dangerous eye off him.  Something made him put his hands protectively on her shoulders.

Just then Kayla stiffened, and Shane felt it.

“Kayla,” he said, gripping her shoulders with enough affection and concern that it drove Steve out of his mind.  “Are you alright?”

Steve found his voice.  “Oh, you’re gonna love this, Donovan.  Bloody good show comin’.”

Chapter Text

Find Me
Chapter 48

Rolf was trying very hard not to panic.  He was sure that the reports the computers were giving him were wrong (because they had to be) and had them process the numbers four additional times.  But they all said the same thing. 

They’d jumped somewhere they weren’t supposed to go. 

The numbers had been hinting at this long enough for Rolf to know the truth, he just didn’t want to admit it, hoped it would work itself out.  But with this jump to a time never intended by this project, he could no longer deny it.  The slipstream was no longer in his control.  Actually, it was never in his control to begin with, because time is simply too variable. 

This was supposed to be a controlled experiment.  But now there were things happening that he had never planned for.  Areas of their timeline that were not shared that they were jumping to anyway.  That was not part of the plan.  Rolf had made sure of that.  The physics were sound, the quantum mechanics were something he was very sure of.  What he couldn’t plan for was their own actions within their jumps.  There was no way to know that those actions were going to have such an impact on the slipstream.  Rolf took a moment to behold the beauty in this inexact science and the absolute power it had. 

Rolf had to try to re-harness his subjects.  But it was impossible.  So, he went to work immediately on figuring out how to make that impossible happen and get control of the slipstream, which had now run amuck. 

Chapter Text

Find Me
Chapter 49

When Kayla arrived, she put the heels of her palms to her eyes and leaned back against the hands on her shoulders to wait out the nausea. 

“Kayla … are you alright?”  Not Steve’s voice.  She knew whose voice it was, however, and she became lucid very quickly. 

When she opened her eyes, a Steve she had never seen before in her life was staring her in the face.  His hair was shorter than she’d ever seen it, he was pale and thin, and he looked like he’d recently been beaten up.  He wore blue jeans, a blue denim shirt, and sneakers, all of them wet.  The worst part was how he was looking at her.  This was a terrible look; she’d never seen this look before.  She knew Shane was behind her with his hands on her shoulders, and she began correctly thinking the worst.

“Steve?” she whispered with a wariness that didn’t get by him. 

She knows, he thought.  She knows I know.

“Welcome to 1991, Sweetness.” Normally she would have been angry at this kind of tone while calling her that; this time she understood.

“Nineteen—“

“Ninety-one.”

Kayla slowly turned her head to see Shane out of the corner of her eye and cringed.  “Oh God,” she said.  It was the moment she had been avoiding for years.  Finally here.  In the worst possible way.  She felt Shane’s hands on her shoulders and went cold.

“You lied to me.”  His voice was low and deliberate, and she had never in her entire life seen him look at her like this.

She shook her head slowly with beseeching eyes.  “I didn’t …,” her eyes continued crying the tears that this body had already been in the midst of when she arrived into it.  “… didn’t know … how to tell you.  I didn’t want you to find out this way.  I thought if I … told you—“

“Just enough!  Right?!  Just enough?  It wasn’t that you moved on, Kayla!  It was who you moved on with – and when.”

Kayla nodded.  “I know,” she cried. 

“Know?” Shane blurted.  “You knew?  What did you know?”  Kayla knew Shane was beyond perplexed, but she didn’t have time to acknowledge him or answer his questions, and neither did Steve.

“Why couldn’t you just tell me?” Steve asked.  “Why couldn’t you trust me?”  Steve had never felt such anger at her.  The pain coursing through him drove him to feel things that shamed him. 

“I’m sorry, baby, I’m sor-sor-sor …” she was starting to hyperventilate as her world came crashing down on her.

“Kayla,” Shane turned her around to face him, “calm down, you’ve done nothing wrong.”

“Yes—I—have!”  She wiggled out of his grasp and backed away, only to lose her footing on the unexpected roller skates and fell to her knees.  She wasted no time trying to get up, but she was shaking and just couldn’t manage to pull herself together enough to get back to a standing position.  Steve didn’t make a move to help her up, and he didn’t react when she flailed in desperation to get to him.  And he hated himself for it.

When Steve didn’t help her, Shane bent to help her up himself, but she stopped him. “No!  No, Shane go!  Just go, I’ll handle this!”  She tugged at the skates to get them off her feet.

“Kayla, don’t be ridiculous, you’re going through a shock, here.  I think we all are.  I’m not leaving you like this.”

“Yes, you are!”  She got the first skate off and went to work on the second but had to untie it.

“Not on your life, Kayla.”

“You’re going to make it worse!” she spat up at him.  “Please, if you care about me, then leave me, I’ll be fine!”  She finally got the skate off and tossed it aside.

“I’m not leaving you on the ground, Kayla, now take my hand if your husband won’t help you.”

Shane helped Kayla up, and she immediately flung herself into Steve’s arms.  “Steve!” she sobbed.  “Please let me explain!”  She stood on the tiptoes of her stocking feet and cried into his shoulder as he absently put his arms around her, a conditioned response his love for her couldn’t help, but the rage overwhelmed his senses.  He wanted to bury his face in her hair and feel her hold him tightly.  He wanted to experience this reunion happily.  But he couldn’t.  The darkness had rooted itself in him like a spreading cancer, and he couldn’t stop it.

Steve gripped her upper arms and dislodged her from him.  She touched his face while she continued to shake.  “What … what’s happened to you?” she asked with a shaky voice.  “You’re wet, did – did you just come out of the river?  Did you arrive this way?  You look like you haven’t eaten in days.”

“I haven’t.”  The anger in his words took Kayla’s breath.

“Why?  Were … were you ...,” She just didn’t have the words to deal with this nightmare come true.

“Was I what, Kayla?!  Was I held by Lawrence Alamain right here in Salem for the last seven months?  Yes.”

“What?!”

“Was I given food with drugs in it so I’d be a good boy?  Yes.”

“Oh God.”

“Was I watching you move on with Shane Donovan before my body was even cold just now, Kayla?   Is that what I was doing, too?”  He could see Shane champing at the bit to get into the fray.

“Steve, let me explain!”

“Now?” he laughed without a shred of humor.  “Now, after three years of having the chance to tell me the whole truth and not just the easy parts, you want to explain?  Save it.  I’ve been gone seven months, Kayla.  Seven months!  It only took you seven months to sleep with him.  I get it!”

Shane interjected, “Now, hold on a second, Steve—“

“You shut the hell up,” he snapped. 

“No!” Shane shot back, “Now that’s just about enough!  You don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“We haven’t slept together yet,” Kayla cried softly.

“WELL, YOU WILL!”

Steve had released Kayla from his grip at this point and backed away a step.  He was so overcome he didn’t know what to do.  Kayla countered by advancing the step he’d retreated, but he put up a hand to halt her.  Then he dropped his head into his hands and let out a pained sound.  Somewhere in the back of her head Kayla knew that Shane was behind her feeling the loss of their mistake of a relationship, but her only focus was on the man that was currently before her in physical and emotional pain.

“God, Kayla,” Steve said more calmly but no less devastated, “I was right here the whole time, baby.  They hadn’t made me a soldier yet, I was here.” 

Kayla let out a pained cry.  “In Salem?  How?”

“I don’t know, but this might help explain things,” he said as he thrust his scarred wrists toward her. 

“Oh, Steve,” Kayla sobbed.  She tried to reach for him, but he pulled his arms away and fixed her with a look that clearly said not to touch him.  He knew if he let her touch him, he’d break down and let her in.

“I was here, and you were –“ I was broken!  He remembered from their fight the other night at the loft.  No, Kayla, I’m the one was about to be broken, you’re the one who was here giving him what was mine!  “—and you weren’t looking for me.”

The look on Kayla’s face turned defiant.  “That’s not fair, Steve Johnson!  Don’t you dare say that to me!  Of course, I wasn’t looking for you, because I buried you!  I saw the flatline myself.  They shocked you with paddles right in front of me goddammit!  Marcus tried!  I had no reason to believe you were still alive.” The pain etching Kayla’s face was now shadowed with anger of her own.  “Do you think I don’t hate myself every day for not knowing you weren’t dead?  It haunts me!” 

Steve wanted so badly to embrace her as the hot tears streamed down her face, hold her, go home with her.  But his rage was consuming him, and he couldn’t do it.  He just stared a hole through her.  “I could have understood all of it.  I would have understood.  So, why did you have to lie to me, Sweetness?” Steve asked.  Kayla emitted a cry at the sound of that name coming out of his mouth. 

“Come home, let me take you home,” she said.

“What home?  The house?  Do we still have a home here?”

Shane had wisely kept silent throughout this entire puzzling exchange, the fact that his relationship with Kayla was over being a given at this point.  Now he spoke up.

“I think we should take him to my house,” Shane said, “call Tarrington at the ISA right away.”

“NO!” Steve boomed.  Then his voice got dangerously quiet.  “You stay the fuck away from me, I’m not going anywhere with you.”

Shane bristled and stepped toward Kayla, placing his hands on her shoulders from behind her.  Kayla turned to him and made herself very clear.  Shane, go.  GO.”

Shane swallowed and covered his face in a mask of stoicism.  “Very well,” he said.  Then he sat down, pulled the skates off, grabbed his shoes, and disappeared around the corner without another word. 

Steve was still staring daggers at her when she turned back to face him.  “Let’s go talk,” Kayla said quietly.

“What is there to talk about, Kayla?”

“How you got here, for starters.”

“Apparently, I’ve been here in Salem the whole time.  Right under your nose.  While you ‘moved on.’”

“Stop it, Steve.  I know you’re angry, but let me explain.”

“You mean like you explained at the loft?”

Kayla wiped her tears and tried to be calm.  “No,” she said meekly.  “The whole thing this time.”

Steve laughed.  There was no humor in it, he just didn’t have any other way to process this unbelievable truth. 

“You’re hurt.”

“No shit.”

“I mean you’re injured.  We need to go somewhere and get you treated.”

“I’m fine.”

She was so afraid to push him.  “At least sit down here, please?”

“I’ve got Alamain’s men after me, Kayla, I can’t stay.”

Kayla jerked her head back and forth, suddenly terrified that he’d be found.  “Ok, I’ll go wherever you say, where do you want to go?  Home base?—No, that won’t work.  I—I—the Emergency Center!”

“Kayla,” he ignored what she’d just said and shook his head in utter disbelief at where they were at.  “Kayla, why couldn’t you trust me to tell me in the first place?  From the beginning?  Why did you keep this from me for three years?”  He finally leaned against the bench he’d just seen she and Shane kissing on, this body almost spent.

“I was ashamed,” she said so softly he could barely hear her.  “I’m still ashamed.  I made a terrible choice.  I hurt my sister.  I wanted it to go away, I wanted it to never have happened!”

“Yeah, well it did happen, Kayla.  And fast, too.”  Kayla felt that last statement like a blow to the face.  And what’s more, she knew she deserved it.  “And now I’m the only one who doesn’t know.  Which makes me a fool, baby.”

“No!  No, you’re not!”  She took a step toward him, but he stepped back. “Steve, please.  You’re so angry.”

“Angry?  I can’t see straight.”

Kayla approached him again very carefully and took his hand.  He let her.  He felt the melee of conflicting emotions like a black fog.  He needed her to comfort him and love him and ease the pain inside of him.  Only she was the very one that was the object of that pain.  It really was a nightmare. 

“Let me take care of you,” Kayla whispered her plea.  We’ll go to Marcus.  You need to get out of those wet clothes.”

“Baby, I’ve got bigger problems than that.  I escaped from that boat over there where they were just about to sell me to Dimera.”  Kayla looked with incredulity at the boat sitting in the harbor so close she could actually see someone running down the deck.  “I can’t talk to you right now.”  Then after he took a deep breath he pointedly asked, “Where’s my daughter?”

“Stephanie?”

“No, Jeannie,” he shot back sarcastically, “yes, Stephanie, where is she?  I want to see her.”

“I – I don’t know.  I don’t know when …” then she spotted the ice cream vendor and this date with Shane all came back to her.  “She’s probably with my folks.”

“I’m going to get her.”

“No!  No, you can’t just show up, she’ll be confused, my parents will pass out.”

“My daughter will know her father!  Unless you’ve had her start calling Shane daddy!”  His voice broke on the last word.

“How dare you,” Kayla said.  “Our daughter knew her father every single day of her life, because I made damn sure that she did.” 

Steve felt a pang of remorse for saying something so terrible to her.  But it didn’t lessen his fury.  Kayla saw the glimmer of apology in his eye, but he didn’t say he was sorry.  Without another word, Steve turned on his heel and continued down the pier.  He had no idea where he was going, but he had to get out of there before his rage smothered him.

“Steve!” she called after him.  “Where are you going?”

“I don’t know!  I don’t have any ties here. I don’t have any clothes or a home left!  I was in the middle of being sold to Stefano Dimera at this time!”

“Don’t leave me.  We have to stay together.”

“No, baby.  No, I can’t be with you right now.”

Kayla’s world was falling away.  She felt like she’d fallen into a chasm and would never be found.  She saw the look on her husband’s face and knew he meant it.  She lashed out with the last of her emotional strength.

“I’m not PERFECT!  You were dead!  I wanted to die, too!  But I didn’t have that same damned luxury because someone had to stay to take care of our baby!”

Steve felt a resurgence of energy and got right up against her.  He held her face in his hands and laid it out for her in a rough whisper.  “It’s the lies, Kayla!  I couldn’t believe it when you told me that you tried once and that you’d never tried again.  That’s a long time to be lonely, and I felt sad and guilty for you!  But you moved on quick.  And you did it with your sister’s husband!  And you made love to him!  And gave him what was mine.  But I was dead, right?  So, I pushed it away.  When you didn’t tell me his name I knew that I didn’t want to know, and I was right!”

Kayla licked her lips of the tears that fell upon them and hated herself.

“But I could have gotten past all of that, Kayla, all of it.  I’m not saying it wouldn’t have hurt, but I would have gotten past it, if only you’d have trusted me, baby.  Told me!  After everything we’ve been though, did you think there was something you could have done to make me think less of you?  How?  How could you think it?” 

Kayla whimpered and caressed her husband’s face in kind as a tear ran down his face. 

“I didn’t tell you about Marina, and that almost cost us our marriage.  I hated myself for years, even today.  Because of what I put us through by lying to you about her.  I mean wasn’t that what all this was about back there?  What we just went through a few hours ago.  I fixed that, but you were still lying about this!  You do the same thing with Shane, hide him from me, and I’m supposed to just let it all go?!”

“No, baby, no, I just –“

“You left me over Marina!  YOU LEFT ME!  And now you want me to stay and listen to you tell me about Shane?”

“Steve,” she wept, “I just want you to let me tell you!”

“Well, that’s just too bad.” He gingerly wiped her tears with the pads of his thumbs and looked upon her with sadness.  “Because I no longer want to hear it.”  Then he released her and turned away.

Kayla fell into a chair outside the Sand Dollar restaurant that hadn’t yet opened for the day, laid her head down in her arms, and cried.  Please come hold me … please tell me you still love me!  It was when she felt the pull in her gut that she finally looked up.  Steve was still turned away from her.  Was he actually going to leave her in the middle of a jump? 

She reached up and touched his arm.  “Steve I’m jumping!” she said.  He turned toward her but did not take her hand.  Please tell me you love me before I go!  She longed for him.  But before another word could be spoken, the jump took her.

Steve watched her leave her body, knowing he had no more than ten more seconds before it was his turn.  He felt no less angry, but he couldn’t help the guilt that washed through him that he let her jump while this rift was between them.  He knew somewhere inside himself that he had to get a grip.  He didn’t know if what he was feeling was unfair or not fair enough.  He didn’t know how to get past her blatant dishonesty.  He didn’t know how to process this kind of anger at his wife, what to do with it, or how to make it stop.   What he did know was that that look on her face as she jumped asked if he still loved her.  “That’s a stupid question,” he rasped as the ice cream man looked upon them with the saddest look of pity.  “I’ll never love anyone else.”  A tear rolled down Steve’s face.  Then he was gone.

When Kayla opened her eyes, she was still in emotional agony.  This destination’s Steve was right in front of her, and she knew that this was a time he still loved her, even if he hadn’t said it in words yet.  She wanted to run to him and bury her head in his warmth and feel him love her without the horrible anger she’d just left behind on that pier.  But that was going to be tricky, because the Steve of this time was pointing a gun at his father, who’d just hit her and shoved her to the floor.  She ran her tongue over the split in her lip, tasted the blood there, and didn’t have a clue what she should do next.

Chapter Text

Find Me
Chapter 50

Kayla’s jaw hurt.  Her ongoing state of mind had no impact on the physicality of the bodies she was jumping into; rather, it was the other way around, and this particular body was in pain.  So now that she’d jumped into it, she was in pain, too.  Kayla was on the floor leaning against the door of Adrienne’s apartment.  She didn’t know how much time she was going to have before her very angry, hurt, and lost husband arrived into this body.  But as she looked up she saw this time’s Steve with a whole different kind of anger in his eyes.  This was not a good moment for Steve to jump into. 

This was a very dangerous situation.  She’d stopped Steve from killing Duke by a hair on the wing of a prayer in 1987.  She always felt that that day could have gone either way, and if it had gone the wrong way, her life would have been very different.  He’d have gone to jail.  They’d have had no marriage, no life together, no children.  She was still reeling from the events on the pier, but she didn’t have time to reflect, she had to be this Kayla and stop Steve from killing his father.

Steve’s eye was darting between her and Duke, and as she looked into it she saw how close to the edge he’d been all those years ago.  This was a man he hated more than anything in this whole world.  A man who should never have been allowed to procreate.  Beating his wife every day, putting her in the hospital time and again, and doing it all in front of his tiny little boy.  She couldn’t begin to understand it then, and she really couldn’t fathom it now that she had her own children.  And now that Duke had added her to his list of women to beat on, Steve was enraged.  She’d seen him like this only one other time, on the roof of the loft with Jack.  It struck her that she was a catalyst for it then, too.  Her own mental state was dark at the moment, leaving her mind so open to drift to all the bad places loving her brought Steve.  Her rape led to Steve almost losing his mind with Jack on the roof, and he nearly died.  Her being so unable to deal with Steve’s death that she made the terrible decision to be with Shane brought him the unspeakable pain that she’d inflicted on him in the last jump.  And now (then?) here with Duke, she tried to hold him back from hurting Steve, resulting in him hitting her so hard that she went flying across the room.  Now Steve looked at her on the floor bleeding because of his father – because she intervened – and for the second time in her life, she watched Steve’s resolve to kill his father bloom.

Steve was wobbly from the blow Duke had delivered – a hard punch to his own child.  But that gun was aimed squarely at the hardened man who had recently put Jo in the hospital.  Kayla shot up as soon as she could.  As she did, she took a moment to feel her own anger and resentment.  These jumps were so random and happened with so little warning that they never had any time to adjust before they had to be “on” again.  Never had time to “tidy up” the last jump or mourn its passing, never had time to adjust to the new jump, never had time to just breathe, dammit!  What Kayla really needed right now was to think.  She needed to think through what just happened on the pier.  It wasn’t that she wanted it, it’s that she needed it.  She was desperate for it.  But she couldn’t reflect, or cry, or feel guilt, or be mad, or even just take a moment to situate herself – it’s not like there was a pause button.  The jumps just kept coming whether she liked it or not, and so it was a never-ending race to wrap up your feelings from the previous one and get on board with the current one.  So the resentment was deep within her at the moment.  She imagined a Wizard behind a curtain in Oz flipping buttons and moving them around like chess pieces in some game that only he understood as she fought a sob that threatened to escape from her throat.  But she didn’t have time, because Steve had just pulled a gun on his father.

“You’re dead,” Steve said.  They were the first words spoken by anyone since she’d arrived in this body.

Duke was scared.  Kayla thought it was amazing how the mighty oppressors can turn into such sniveling little cowards when harm is imminent.  “Hey kid, put that thing away,” he said very carefully so as not to push any more of Steve’s buttons.  “I mean, you don’t know what you’re doin’.”

“Oh, I know exactly what I’m doin’,” Steve huffed.  He was so heavily affected by the years of hatred for this man.  He was so focused on the culmination of it all in this moment.  Now Kayla was scared, too.  Scared that she might not be able to stop him, because she was lucky to have done it the first time.  Scared that he might not forgive her for hiding Shane from him.  Scared that they might stay in this jump too long or not long enough. She didn’t know which end was up she was so lost.  So, she just tried to focus on stopping Steve from killing him. Do that and then take it from there.  One moment at a time.

“Steve,” Kayla spoke for the first time.  “Steve, I –“

“You’re a pig,” he told Duke. It’s not that he didn’t hear her, he was just too enraged to listen.  “You’re nothin’ but a filthy, disgusting pig.”  Then he added with quiet menace, “And you don’t deserve to live.” 

A shiver ran down Kayla’s spine. 

“So this time, I’m gonna do the job right,” Steve said with a grin and Duke started to sweat. 

Kayla was frozen.  “Steve, don’t,” she tried to reason with him, and she would have gone on, but that was when he clicked back the hammer of the gun and tightened his mouth into a thin line of pointed resolve.

“Come on, Steve,” Duke said, trying to lay it on thick.  “Come on, let’s talk about this.”

“Shut up, shut up, I’m sick of you!” Steve spat back in a barely controlled whisper.

“Steve,” Kayla tried again, “Please listen to me, you can’t do this, you have to just listen to me.”

Just then Duke went for the door, but he didn’t get far before his son stopped him with a verbal threat that was nothing short of a promise.  He motioned Duke to the back wall while Steve took up a more secure position by the door.  Then he finally acknowledged her.

“I’m sick of listenin’, Kayla, I’m sick of talkin’.  Now, I’m gonna do somethin’ about this.”  Even as he said it, Kayla got a distinct sense that there may have been a sliver of doubt, that maybe she would get through to him again. She just needed to keep talking.  Get him away from Duke before her Steve jumped in.

“Steve, think about what you’re doing, here!”

“Stay out of this, Kayla, this is between him and me.”

Then Duke started pleading.  “Ok, ok, I know I’ve been trouble, I’ve made mistakes, I ain’t a good father, I ain’t a good husband, I know all that, kid, but people can change!  And I swear to you , I know I can change, too.”  The déjà vu with that plea from Duke hit her, and she was struck by just how wretched and useless a human being this man really was.  He could really let people have it on his own terms, but the moment the tables were turned, he became a weak and cowardly little man.

Steve saw Kayla visibly balk at his father and felt somehow validated.  He laughed and said, “You think your pathetic begging is gonna do you any good here?  It just makes me sicker.  It makes me hate you more.”  Steve was seething.  Then his eye suddenly went wide, and he froze. 

No … no, no, no, no, no ….

Kayla called to Steve softly, but his face went blank.  Put plainly, Kayla simply was not ready for Steve to get there.  She didn’t know what she was going to say to him, and her conflicting emotions threatened to smother her.  She was aching for him … and mortified at his revelation … and terrified of how he now felt about them … and feeling guilty about her deception … and, quite frankly, scared out of her mind of what he was going to do to this pathetic excuse of a man who called himself Steve’s father. 

For his part, Duke didn’t have a clue that now was his chance to run, as Steve’s hold on the gun hadn’t wavered a bit, and despite looking his son directly in the eye, that gun was really all he was seeing.

“Dammit!” Kayla whispered under her breath as she gave a small stomp of frustration.  Why here?  Why of all places for them to jump did they have to go here to such a volatile situation when Steve was already so upset?  Before she realized what she was doing she went to Duke and let loose on him.  “I want you to know that I hate you.”  He shifted his eyes between her and over her shoulder at his son, unsure how Steve would react.  Kayla continued having her say while she still could.  “I hate you for hurting Steve when he was a little boy …,” she pointed behind her.  Then more softly with narrowed eyes, “and what you took from Adrienne.  How could you hurt your baby like that?  You’re a monster, and I won’t let you ruin our family!” 

Duke’s reaction was cut off by Steve inhaling sharply behind her.  Kayla whirled around to see Steve’s eye rolling as he fought the jump effect.  Her heart was beating so hard and so fast she thought she might pass out. 

The first thing Steve saw was the face of Duke Johnson staring cautiously back at him.  Steve was stunned.  He was not prepared for this and bobbed just slightly with the shock of it.  His eye went wide as his arm continued pointing the gun at him of its own accord.  Then he saw Kayla standing in front of him, and pain welled up inside him immediately.  She was so beautiful.  She wore the same red sweater he’d just seen two jumps ago (Three? Six?  He was losing his mind).  Had it really been just the other day that he said he wanted to go to the courthouse to get married?  Then the reality of it all hit him.  Kayla watched the pain she’d just left him with back on the pier flood back into his face.  And she would have done anything to have wiped that pain away.

Kayla saw Steve’s gaze go to her mouth and she wiped at it quickly, as if that would erase his memory of Duke having hit her.  It didn’t, and his face flushed red.  She felt an odd mixture of fear for what he might do, and relief that her pain upset him. 

Kayla knew it was him, but she asked the question anyway.  “Do you remember –“ 

“I don’t wanna play,” he replied, training a hard eye on her.  He looked at his father with disdain and tasted his own blood on his lips and inside his cheek.  Steve raised the gun.  “Did he hurt you before I got here?”

Kayla felt like that one statement was progress.  “No, I jumped in after he hit me.”  She reached for him, but he backed up a step.  So much for progress.  He glanced at her just for a moment, but that glance held everything she needed to know; he wasn’t going to be forgiving her right now.  Kayla choked back a sob.

“Listen kid,” Duke said oblivious to the drastic change that had just taken place, “Just put the gun down.”

“Steve,” Kayla said from her position still between them.  “Please just put it down.  You and I need to talk.  We can go to home base now.  No one’s after anyone.  And—“

“He’s after my family, Kayla, don’t you get that?  Did you forget?  Ya know, you’ve been forgetting things lately.”

Kayla tried to remain unaffected by his continued anger.  “We can call the police to get him, then.  Or take them back with us.”

“Look,” Duke said, “I’m not after anyone, I just want to take my family home.  Come on,” he said with used car salesman slickness, “you’ve got your own life here.  Now, I just wanna take your mama home where she belongs, and your little sister.  That’s all, you live your life, and we’ll all leave.”

The mention of Steve’s sister brought the reality of this situation roaring into him like a pack of wild horses.  This man raped my sister.  He raped his own daughter.  Incest.  Filth.  Wife-beater.  Scum.  Kayla watched as the look in her husband’s eye became deadly.

“Not this time,” Steve said as he raised the gun strong and straight in front of him. “You’re not going to hurt anyone this time, you piece of shit.  Because this time I am going to kill you.”

Kayla knew they were in trouble, and she couldn’t help but feel like she’d caused it.  If his emotional state hadn’t been so thrown into utter chaos by what he had to discover on the pier, he would be in a better frame of mind to deal with this jump, with seeing his father.  He’d be able to control the emotions that made him want to kill him in the first place.  It would be hard, but she knew he could do it, she would help him do it.  Instead, he was in emotional turmoil. 

Terror ran through her.  If he killed his father, he was going to ruin their lives.  They’d be ruined for however long this jump lasted, and most importantly, he’d be living with the fact that he killed his father for the rest of his life.  Even if his actions were despicable.  Even if he did on some level deserve whatever he would one day get.  And even if Duke didn’t stay dead on subsequent jumps, the fact that Steve committed the action in the first place would follow him no matter where and when he was, and it would have happened because he was lashing out at what she’d done.  She had to protect both of them from that. 

Another thought ran through her.  They did something that wasn’t supposed to happen in Cleveland, and it caused them to jump out of sync.  If they made another monumental change, like killing someone who wasn’t supposed to be dead, then what would that do to them?  We don’t know that anything causes anything! she screamed to herself.  She shook it away, she shook it all away. She had to make Steve see the love inside himself so he could let all the anger he had go … so they could be ok and find a way back to each other.

Steve went to cock the hammer of the gun back but felt that it was already in position.  “It’s time for you to go.”

“NO!” Kayla yelled as she splayed herself in front of Duke.

Steve was so tense he was practically holding his breath.  “Don’t do this again, Kayla, get the hell away from him.”

“I’m not gonna let you kill him,” she said more desperately than she’d intended.  She was going for matter-of-fact, but she ended up with borderline hysterical.

“Get out of the way!  I’m mad enough at you already!”

“Really?” she shot back.  “What’s that supposed to mean, exactly?”

“Exactly what it means, baby, now move.”

“You’re holding a gun and saying you’re mad enough at me, am I supposed to be scared now?”  Steve didn’t reply, and he didn’t take his eye off his father, who was listening very carefully.  “Now, I know you’re mad, and you have every right to be!  But this is not going to help.” 

“Get out of the way!” he roared.

“No!  I’m not going to let you kill someone, no!”

“Nobody deserves it more than him, Kayla, especially now!  You saw what he did last time you stopped me!  And look where that got us!”  Steve watched his father try to remember what time he could be talking about and got some amusement out of his confusion.

“It got us a marriage, and a family!”

“And what did it get for Adrienne?!”

“You want to blame me, Steve?  Fine.  Go ahead.  Blame me.  You do that, because it’s worth it not to see what you’re going to do to yourself if you pull that trigger.  I love you—“

“Don’t, Kayla,” he whispered, her words stinging his soul.

“—and I’m not gonna watch you commit murder because you’re mad at me.”

Steve swayed back and forth on his heels, every sense heightened, every nerve on fire, his soul aching to collapse into her arms, but his anger over her deception fueling his absolute determination to rid the earth of this monster of a human being. 

“Kayla, you can tell me anything you want, baby, I don’t care.  Because nothin’s gonna stand in my way this time.  He’s not leaving this room alive, and if I have to physically move you, I will.”

“You kill him, Steve,” she said solemnly, “you will go to jail.  There will be no bail this time, you know that.  And we’ll be separated.  Is that what you want?”  Please tell me that’s not what you want.

Kayla thought she saw Steve’s face flicker with this, but then Duke put his hands on her shoulders, and Steve exploded.  “Get your filthy hands off her!  Right now, off, OFF!”  He waved the gun in a remove-your-hands-from-her motion, and Duke put up his hands like it was a stick up.  Once again, Kayla’s heart soared that he clearly loved her, but sank at the blatant hatred he’d channeled against his father.

“Steve, I’m ok!  I’m ok, we’re gonna be ok!”

“Are we?” he replied not sure if she intended the double meaning or not.

“Yes.  We are,” she said with a conviction she faked with all she had in her.  “Please put the gun down, please.  If we’re separated – if you go to jail here, we won’t be married, we won’t have Stephanie.” 

“Baby,” he laughed, “what the hell are you talking about?  We’re not gonna be here long enough to have Stephanie, that’s another lifetime, baby.  A whole other lifetime!”

“You don’t know that!  What’s our record, eight days?  Nine days?  How do you know the next one won’t be nine years?  Stuck here.  Without each other?”

“You’ve been sayin’ that for weeks, Kayla. It doesn’t matter what I do, it’s not like he’ll stay dead, right?  But here, baby … here he’ll stay dead.  However long here’s gonna be.  And you’re not gonna stop me!”  He shouted so loudly that Kayla fought not to flinch.

“Listen to the little lady, Steve.”

“You shut your face, old man, I don’t wanna hear you!”

Suddenly the tension in the room was so thick Kayla could feel it like a cold fog rolling in off the riverfront.  She decided that she had nothing to lose than to just lay herself out there and hope to get through to him.  “I know you’re angry with me,” she said with a calm that didn’t match the tears beginning to streak her face and sting the cut in her lip.

“Angry?  I’m lost, Sweetness,” he choked.

“Then come home to me, Steve, please come home to me.  Don’t make a bad decision here to help you deal with the hurt I’m causing you.”

“I can’t, baby.  Don’t push me.”

“Please, Steve,” she persisted though her tears.  “Let me in?  Please?”  She prayed to God that she was getting through to him.  Then she went for broke.  “You are not a violent man.  The father of my children is a good, gentle soul.  He didn’t kill Duke.  Not in this time, not in any time.  He can be mad at me all he wants, but he’s not doing this.”  She was weeping now, and she could see she was breaking him down.

Unshed tears blurred Steve’s vision as he shook his head and wiped his eye with the back of his hand.

Duke chose that weak moment between the two of them to grab Kayla into a dangerous headlock, and she screamed despite herself.  Duke’s left arm was around her neck, and his right arm had wrapped itself in the other direction around her head.  He applied significant pressure around her neck with his beefy forearm, and she could smell the cigarette smoke embedded into every pore of his body.  Then she felt her air supply start to drastically decrease.

“Ya always were a stupid fool!” Duke spat at his son.  “Couldn’t set me on fire right, now can’t even shoot me right.  Now you put that gun down, or I’ll break her neck!”

Steve gripped the gun with both hands at the end of ramrod straight arms and pointed it at his father, which meant he was effectively pointing it at both of them.  “You let her go right now!” Steve yelled.

“No, no, sonny boy, you’re not the big man you thought you were.  Now you throw that gun to me and step away or I’ll do more than just give her a little smack on that great big mouth of hers.  I’ll break her pretty little neck!  Don’t test me, boy!”

Steve could hear the horrible sound of Kayla gagging as she fought with her lower body to get air, and he made a split second decision.  “I’m the one holding the gun, old man, and I don’t have a thing to lose here.  You kill her, I swear to you, I’ll kill you, too.  This gun gives me the last word, and if it comes down to that, then this time she won’t be there to save your miserable ass.”  Steve was dead still as he made this promise to him.  “Now you release her.  And if she turns one more shade of red, I’ll make sure I shoot your testicles off first.”

Duke saw something in his son’s eye.  Something he was sure meant business.  Duke released the pressure on her neck but he didn’t release her.  He gave it one more try as Kayla started gasping for air.  “Oh yeah, Stevie, then come on and shoot!  Come on, you want me dead so bad you’re gonna kill your own girlfriend?”

“Shut up!”

“’Cause that’s where you’re headed, kid, ‘cause I’m not letting her go!  So, if you shoot, the bullet’s goin’ through her first, sonny boy!”

“Shut up!” Steve yelled as he looked into her eyes beseeching her for what he did not know.  “You let her go, she’s not breathin’!”

“I’m breathing,” Kayla croaked.  “I’m ok, please don’t kill him, just let him go, we’ll get him later!”

“You still want to let him go?!”

“No, I want you to be ok, Steve, there’s a difference!”

She was gasping, and Steve could barely take it.  He let one hand drop and tilted the gun sideways with the other.  “I’m not tellin’ you again, Duke.  Let. Kayla. Go.”

Duke didn’t see how Steve could possibly win this one, and just to drive the screws to him even tighter, Duke twisted Kayla’s head so that all he needed to do was tug hard and her neck would snap. 

Kayla couldn’t see anything but the colors the strain on her spinal cord was sending up to her brain.  Maybe killing him would be ok, she reasoned with herself as she struggled to breathe.  But when she heard Steve back down she registered relief, anyway.

“Ok!” Steve shouted, “Ok!  Let her go!  Gun’s down,” he said as he put the hammer back and let it swing on his finger.  “Now just let her go!”

In that moment, Duke released Kayla, and she fell to the floor gasping for breath and dizzy from the sudden pressure release. 

That’s when Duke smiled an evil, toothy grin.  He looked down at Kayla and snickered, “I always liked blondes, too.”  Then he absently adjusted the waistband of his jeans.

That’s when Steve righted the gun in his hand, raised it up, and shot his father square in the chest. 

As the shot rang out, Steve flinched despite himself.  Kayla gasped and hit the floor covering her head with her hands.  No!  Oh God, no!  Please let this be a nightmare. Just a very bad nightmare!  I want to wake up now, I want to wake up now!  It’s time to feed Joe, it’s time to get up, wake up! 

Unfortunately, Kayla was already awake in a very real world where Steve had just killed his father.  An act she was unable to stop this time.  An act that she helped cause. 

Duke fell to his knees behind Kayla, and she scurried away toward Steve as he did.  He put his hand up to his wound and looked at the blood now staining his fingers.  Then he looked up at Steve, the son he’d abused almost every day, who’d failed to kill him twice before but now succeeded, and who now looked down on him with numbness. 

Finally Steve spoke.  “My wife is the last woman you’ll ever hit.”  A thrill involuntarily swept through Kayla at the use of the word “wife.”  “Mama’s safe now.  And you won’t be laying a hand on Adrienne.”  The look of shock on Duke’s face gave Steve immeasurable satisfaction, but there was no pleasure in the act he’d just committed.  In fact, he felt strangely ambivalent.  “And a man I’d wished were dead every single day of my entire life finally is.”  Duke opened his mouth, but no words came out as his eyes went wide.  “Go to hell,” Steve said.  And that’s exactly what Duke did as he collapsed on the floor on his side and died with his eyes staring open.

Steve dropped the gun.  Kayla started to shake.  She’d thought Steve discovering Shane was her worst nightmare, but she was wrong, this was.  She turned and wrapped her arms around Steve’s leg, leaned her head against his thigh, and cried. 

“Get up, Kayla,” Steve said with an absent sort of tone.

“I did this to you,” she sobbed.  “Dear God, I did this to you!”

Steve leaned down and lifted her up with one strong arm.  “I don’t want you on the floor when the cops come to take me away, Sweetness.”

Kayla struggled to find a way through the chaos.  She begged herself to focus and think of what to do next.  And suddenly the events of that day came flooding into her with a clarity that was almost not human.  “J-J-Jo and Ad-Ad-Ad …” she took a deep breath, “… your sister are coming any minute.  We have to go.  Now.  We have to go.”  She took him by the hand and headed for the door.

“No, baby, someone must have heard the shot and called the cops by now.  I wanna go to the cages.”  His voice was so affected – actually it was more like the opposite of affected.  He’s numb, she realized.  She knew with alarming veracity that if she didn’t get them somewhere to wait this jump out, somewhere they could talk through their feelings and make themselves as whole as they possibly could, that he’d carry this shock and trauma with him right into the next jump and the one after that and the one after that. 

She’d lose him. 

The thought terrified her. Worse than jumping apart.  At least then she’d know he was out there, her Steve, whole and loving both her and, importantly, himself.  She wasn’t so sure she loved herself right now, but she pushed it away and took control before it was too late.

“Steve!” she said firmly as she grabbed his chin to look at her.  “We are leaving.  We’re going to the loft because your apartment is the first place they’ll look,” she said digging in her purse for her keys, which she found.  “Let’s go.”

Steve just wanted to go to sleep. He was so tired.  He didn’t want to think about any of this anymore.  He didn’t want to think about his pain.  He didn’t want to think about Shane or the warehouse he couldn’t remember or Baby Ruths or roller skates or the sad and remorseful look of self-hatred he saw in his wife’s eyes when she was pleading with him on the pier and he refused to give her a chance. He didn’t want to think about the blood that was no longer pumping in his father because he’d put a bullet into his heart – his own father’s heart – and the fact that he wasn’t sorry to see him finally dead.  He didn’t want to think about how Adrienne must have felt when she did the same thing after he forced himself on his own daughter and what she must have gone though to get over what he took from her.  He didn’t want to think about the revolting expression on his father’s face when he looked down at Kayla and said he liked blondes.  He didn’t want to think about how he’d just committed a violent act, just like his father committed violent acts, because he wasn’t like him.  He loved his children.  His children … He didn’t want to think about them or Kayla.  No, he didn’t want to think about how furious he was at this woman he continued to love so much.  He didn’t want to think about his own sorry ass.  He just wanted to sleep.  

Kayla looked into Steve’s eye and knew he was already fighting a demon. 

“Just let ‘em take me to jail, Kayla.  There’s no point in hiding, when I jump that’ll be that, why bother?”  He said it with such defeat; such finality.

She stayed strong, forced him to look at her, and said in no uncertain terms, “We stay together.”

With that she picked up the gun, shoved it in her purse, and dragged him out the door, praying to God that he’d find a way to forgive her for everything that led up to this … and that she could help him forgive himself for what he’d just done.

Chapter Text

Find Me
Chapter 51

Steve flinched when the antiseptic hit his lip.

“Sorry,” Kayla said gently, but Steve didn’t reply.  He just sat on the toilet seat lid and stared at her as she continued to clean the wound his father had given him.  “Did he hit you near your eye?” she asked with concern, not making a move to examine it just yet.  He blinked and looked away, so she moved her head so that he had to look at her.  “Steve did he hit you in the eye?”

He looked at her and said, “It doesn’t matter.”

“Humor me.”

“No,” he said coldly.

Kayla nodded and continued cleaning the blood away from his face from her spot across from him sitting on the edge of the bathtub. 

“Your lip needed stitches the first time, too.”

The mention of his lip made him think of hers.  He reached his hand up to her mouth and wiped the blood away from it.  But it was still tender, and she recoiled a bit; Steve dropped his hand.

“You shouldn’t have thrown it in the river, Kayla.”

“What should I have done with it, brought it back with us?”

“No, you should have just left it where I dropped it and let them take me in.”

“And then we’d be separated.  I guess that’s probably what you want, isn’t it?  If you don’t have to look at me, you won’t have to face how badly you’re hurting.”

“You wanna analyze me, Kayla, go ahead and analyze that I finally did it and killed my old man after all these years.”  The anger and hurt she knew was simmering beneath the surface was starting to color his unaffected tone.  “Third time’s the charm, baby.  Why don’t you tell me what you think of that, huh?”

“I think that was the worst place you could have possibly jumped to after what happened on the pier.”

“Please, baby you gonna blame yourself, now?  You gonna go and make this about you?”

“Isn’t it?” she threw back at him.

“I’m not sorry he’s dead, Kayla, if you’re waiting for me to say that, you’re gonna be waiting a long time.”

“You know what, I’m not sorry he’s dead, either, but that’s not what’s really going on here.”  Steve clicked his tongue, but Kayla wasn’t going to let it go.  “You were lashing out at me.”

Kayla was sitting too close to him, he could barely take it.  The feelings inside of him were so raw and bleeding into each other so badly that he wasn’t going to be able to keep them inside much longer.  He killed his father, and he wasn’t sorry; that bothered him.  And the fact was that he was lashing out at her, and that bothered him even more.

“I was ridding the world of that piece of shit!”

“’Cause he was about to kill me!”

Steve shot up and went to the other end of the small room, trying to put distance between them.  “No, I put the gun down when he was about to kill you!  I shot him when he started seeing you naked in his filthy little mind!  I could see him doin’ it, too, just like he did to my sister before he raped her!”

“So you were protecting me all the same!”

“You want me to apologize?  For making sure he didn’t kill you?  For making sure he didn’t go near Adrienne, that sick son of a bitch?”

“No, Steve, I’m not looking for any apologies from you.  I’m not sorry he’s dead, either.”

“Good, because he is dead, Kayla!” he roared. 

“But I am sorry that what happened with us back on the pier is what made you do it.”

“Just stop it, I don’t wanna hear you turn this into some kind of therapy session, I’ve had more than enough of those, baby, don’t you think?!  I didn’t kill him because of you and Shane!  Now, you wiped off the gun, you threw it in the river, you dragged me here, now I’ve done it your way, baby, why do you have to keep pushing?!”

“Because lying to yourself isn’t going to make things better, Steve, we have to be honest with each other.”

“Oh, now you want honesty?!  Like the fucked up version of honesty you’ve been usin’ for the past three years, Sweetness?!”

Kayla couldn’t stand when Steve called her Sweetness when he was angry.  He almost never did it, but this one hit her hard.  She knew that she had to get him to talk about Shane and how hurt he was, but she couldn’t help feeling her own stab of pain when he called her Sweetness that way.  Kayla looked away from him as her eyes got glassy, stood up from the edge of the tub, and went into the bedroom that they weren’t yet sharing.  She sat on the edge of the bed and silently cried as she waited for him to come out. 

When he finally did, she thought he would walk past her and go downstairs, but she was surprised when he sat down next to her.  He didn’t touch her, but he didn’t run, either. 

They sat that way for a while.  Silent.  Lost.  “I know you’re mad at me,” Kayla spoke first, looking straight out rather than at him.  “You should be.  I hurt you,” her voice wavered, and Steve’s heart tightened, “so … if you’re trying to hurt me back, you’re doing a good job.”

Steve exhaled heavily, then he took her hand in his and held it in his lap.  Kayla closed her eyes and felt the biggest wave of homesickness as she felt her hand in his.

“I’m begging you not to shut me out,” she said.

“What is there to say, Kayla, you were in love with Shane back there, and I lost my mind.  I think that sums it up.”  Now that he was holding it, he couldn’t quite let go of her hand.

“That doesn’t at all sum it up,” she replied as she she finally turned to look at him.  She reached her palm up to the side of his scarred face and turned him to face her.  “And if you would let me explain it to you, you’d see.”

“Like you let me explain about Marina before you ran out of our house?” He said it so sharply, belying the gentle way he was holding on to her hand.  Somewhere deep inside him, he needed the comfort of that hand, even as his anger drove him.

“Didn’t we get over that?  Twice?” she said just as sharply.  “It’s not the same.”

“It’s exactly the same.  You ran, I ran.” 

It wasn’t the same, but Kayla didn’t want to argue, so she conceded the point.  “Ok, fine, now let’s talk about it.”

“Baby, we’ve got bigger problems, Abe and Roman are gonna be here any minute.”

“You don’t know that,” she said, “they might think it’s some random shooting.”

“They’re not gonna think that, Kayla, try to remember when we are!  This is 1987, baby, neither one of them care a lick about me!  They’re not stupid, they’re gonna go to my place first, and when I’m not there they’re comin’ straight here, and you know it.”

She didn’t want to admit to herself that he was right, but he was.  “Then we’ll hide you on the roof like we used to do.”  Steve clenched his jaw and released her hand.  She felt a small emotional loss when he did.  “What?” she said with frustration.

“There’s no point in hiding, Kayla.”

“Do you want us to be separated?!” she finally allowed herself to raise her voice.  “Do you?!  We’re in the middle of a jump, Steve!   Do you really want to risk jumping when we’re not together simply because you’re mad at me?”

“Simple?” he yelled back in equal measure.  “That bullshit on the pier with Shane doesn’t feel simple to me, Kayla!  It feels – like—“  Wasn’t this what he didn’t want to do right now?  Talk about how he felt?  “It doesn’t feel simple, dammit!”  He walked to the stairs and sat down on the stoop with his head in his hand.

Kayla blanched.  “I’m sorry, Steve.  I’m sorry that you don’t have the luxury of running now.  But we’re not at home. We can’t just retreat somewhere and know when we wake up we’re still going to be at home.  We can’t separate, and you know it.  I won’t let us.”

“We arrive separately, so what does it matter?”

Kayla looked crushed.  “So, you really don’t care?  Really?” 

She was crying now, and Steve relented.  “No,” his voice broke, “Ok, no, I don’t want to be separated.”  Kayla put her head in her hands in relief.  Steve wanted to reach out for her and let her hold him.  Instead he stayed where  he was sitting on the top step.  “But what’s done is done,” baby, he said defeated.  “I did kill Duke.  And they are going to find me.  And now that I’m here, you’re going to be arrested as an accessory.”

“No, I—“

“Yes, Kayla, you are, use your head, you know it as well as I do.”  The look in Kayla’s eyes told Steve that she knew he was right.  “It’s not what I want.  There are lots of things I didn’t want.  But if they find me here, then we’re both going to jail, and at least one of us needs to be able to keep tabs on the other.”

“What are you saying, that you should leave?”

“That’s exactly what I’m saying.”

This made Kayla hopping mad.  When she stood up, Steve saw his 2009 Kayla’s red hot temper piercing him with her 1987 eyes.  “I have had just about enough of you leaving me for one lifetime, thank you very much!  You are mad at me, fine, Steve, FINE.  You don’t want to talk about Shane, that’s fine, too, you go ahead and let it eat at you, then.  But we’re going to have to finally address it unless you’re done with me.”

Now he stood up, too, as his temper exploded.  “I didn’t say that, Kayla, DID I SAY THAT?!” 

“Well, you sure are acting like it!” 

Yeah, you are, he realized. 

“You won’t let me explain, you’ll barely let me touch you, you’re calling me Sweetness like it’s a dirty word, and you’re ready to leave me in the middle of a jump. What am I supposed to think?!”

You’re supposed to have faith in me, Sweetness, that’s what.  “I’m never going to be done with you,” he said as his own tears began.  “You think I don’t love you?”  Kayla let out a choked sob.  “I’m just so angry I can’t see straight.”

“Then we have to work together,” she cried as she walked into his arms and held him tight.  It was too much for him, her smell, the way she looked, the way she cried in his arms.  He just plain needed her so much that he couldn’t help but hold her, too.  It didn’t make him any less furious, but he couldn’t not hold her back.  “And you leaving me, again, is not the way.  You left me when you pushed me to Jack.  You left me when you died, and then you left me again after that horrible night when you were dreaming.  No more leaving, Steve.  We’ll just have to go somewhere and wait this jump out, that’s all.  We have to stay together no matter what it takes.”  She cried into his shirt, and he cried into her big, blonde curls. 

Steve finally pushed her away and turned from her, wiping his face with his hand. 

“Steve?”  When he didn’t answer her she called to him again; it took everything in her not to reach back out for him.

“I’m so tired Kayla,” he said quietly.  “You have no idea how tired I am.”

“Does that mean you’re staying?”

“Yeah.  I’m staying.”

Kayla wiped her eyes, her mascara now smeared to dark shadows beneath her eyes.  Steve saw it and remembered how beautiful she used to look on his doorstep in the rain and felt a painful pang of loneliness.

“Ok,” she said as she steadied her emotions.  “Thank you.”  He didn’t reply, just gave her a small nod.

They spent the next ten minutes suggesting and rejecting places to go.  It was too cold for the fishing shack, it was too hard to get to the lighthouse undetected.  It was too early to go to Neil’s, and his place was out of the question.  Finally Steve let her convince him that staying right there to hide in plain sight was their best option.  Sure enough, moments after Steve relented Roman was pounding on the loft door.

“That was a lot faster than I thought it would be.”

Steve glared an “I told you so” at her, and she shooed him onto the roof.  “Promise me you’ll be there when I come back,” she said forcefully. 

“Kayla!” Roman yelled from downstairs.

Steve looked away from her and worked the muscle in his jaw.  In response he could feel her panic come off of her in waves, it was that strong.  “I’ll be here,” he said, and Kayla let out the breath she’d been holding.  “You look like you’ve been crying, Kayla, how’re you gonna explain that one?”

“Dammit, Kayla, we see your car and know you’re here, now open this door!”

“I can handle Roman.  You just trust me.” 

He shot her a look that he immediately regretted when she looked positively stricken.  Roman wasn’t getting any more patient and he had to get her focus off of them and onto her brother.  He shot his hand out to cup her face and reassured her, “If I didn’t trust you I would have already left.  I will be here.  Now go.”

She leaned in to kiss his cheek, and he let her.  Then she turned to fly down the spiral staircase, and he closed the door to the roof.

It took Kayla an hour to get rid of her brother and Abe.  Neither of them believed her at first when she said she didn’t know where Steve was.  She played dumb and asked the questions she wasn’t supposed to know the answers to, and when they didn’t tell her the whole story, which unbeknownst to them she already knew, she got them to spill the rest in dribs and drabs.

“Why would I know where he is?”

“Because you were last seen leaving the hospital in a big damn hurry saying that you were about to go see Steve, that’s why,” Roman said.

“Look,” Abe added, “If you’re trying to protect him, this isn’t the way.  A man is dead, Kayla.  Now, the best way you can help Steve is to tell us where he is.”

Kayla folded her arms in front of her and fixed them each with a defiant look.  “I did go see Steve, we were on the pier.  He was still there when I left.  I came right home, and then you came pounding on my door.  Why would I know where he is now?”

“You would if you were hiding him, Sis, wouldn’t you?”

“You wanna look, be my guest,” she said with a healthy dose of being offended at the insinuation.

“Yeah, I will have a look,” Roman said.  “Have you been crying?” he asked.

Kayla wiped at her eyes, annoyed that they gave her away.  “It’s been a terrible day.  Work.”

“Roman,” Abe started relenting, “we might be barking up the wrong tree.”

“Abe’s right, Roman, you are.  Steve is not a violent man.  His father sure is, though, I saw him rough up Steve’s mother with my own eyes.”

“You saying she might have done this?”

Oh no!  “No, she’s in no condition to lift a finger toward anyone, Adrienne is taking care of her.  But he could have easily ticked off the wrong person down on the riverfront.”

Kayla was digging a hole and just wanted her brother and Abe gone.  If she didn’t get them out the door right now she was going to confess, herself.  “Abe, Roman, he’s not here, I don’t know where he is, if you want to look, do it.  Then go, ‘cause I’ve had a really long day and just want to be alone.”

Roman ran up the spiral staircase, and Kayla tried with everything she had not to look nervous or like she was holding her breath.  Abe watched her intently.  “Care to check the guest room?” she snarked.

“No,” he said, “I’m sure Roman’s gonna go there next.”

Sure enough, Roman bounded down the stairs and ran into the guest room, found no one, and reported to Abe that he wasn’t there.

“Did you check the roof?” Abe asked calmly, never taking his eyes off Kayla.

“Damn!” Roman said and ran back up the stairs.

Abe saw her eyes flicker and gave her a look of disappointment.  Then he ran up after Roman, knowing he’d found them out.  Kayla was in full panic mode now, yelling after them that Steve wasn’t on the roof, it was freezing up there, anything she could think of to stop Roman from opening that metal door.  When he did, she just started praying for a jump.  Jump, jump, jump, jump … If she just said it over and over again, maybe they’d go no place like home.  It didn’t happen before Roman emerged back through the doorway.  The last thing she expected, however, was for him to come back without her husband. 

“Place is clean, partner,” Roman announced with frustration. 

Abe looked with confusion upon Kayla, who had her own perplexed look on her face.  “I was so sure” he said as if he were thinking out loud. 

Now Kayla was a whole different kind of scared.  He left me. He really left me.  She couldn’t help the tears that had begun to stream down her face as she followed them back down.  God, I’m so sick of crying. 

“Listen, Sis,” he said as he slid open the loft door, “If you – why are you crying, Buttercup?!”  He brought her into a hug, and she let loose.  “Aw, honey, I didn’t mean to upset you, I’ve just gotta do my job, here.”

“I’ve just had a real bad day, Roman,” she said.  She knew he wasn’t really Roman, but he felt like her brother, just the same, as she cried.  “I lost someone today, I got punched in the face, and my lip hurts, and now Steve is missing and you think he killed his father.  I just want to … turn back the clock and get things right.  I’d do anything to just get them right.”

“Who punched you?!”

“No one important, it’s not the first time.”

“Patient, huh?”

Kayla just nodded.

“Listen, if you wanna press charges against this guy,” Abe added, “you just say the word.”

Kayla shook her head against Roman’s shoulder and wiped her nose with his shirt.  “No, he won’t be a problem anymore.  I just want to … I don’t know what I want.”

“I know, honey, you just want to get some rest.”  He pulled back from her and turned her face from side to side by her chin.  “Looks just as pretty as always, Sis.”

Kayla smiled slightly.  He was a good brother to her, and she missed him.  As they left, Kayla called back out to him, “Roman!”  When he looked back, she said, “I love you, ya know.” 

“I love you, too, Sis.”

She slid the loft door closed and listened as the elevator engaged.  Then she leaned her back against the door, sank down to the floor, and layed her head down on her knees.  How could you leave me? 

“Baby.”

Kayla screamed she was so caught so off guard by Steve’s unexpected presence standing outside the guest room.

“It’s me!  It’s ok, baby, it’s just me.”

Kayla looked up at him in disbelief.  “Steve!  You didn’t leave?  But how …?”

Steve bent down on one knee in front of her.  “I’m sorry I scared you,” he said with the first gentle voice he’d spoken to her with since he’d found her on the pier with Shane.  “I was watching through the skylight.  I snuck back in to listen when Roman went back down there.  But then Abe mentioned the roof.  I ran down that fire escape fast.  Walked back in through the front door and hoped no one would go back into the guest room.”

Kayla was so stunned by the fact that he hadn’t left her that she didn’t blink the whole time he was explaining.  Then she flung her arms around him and held on fiercely. She didn’t say a word, just held on. 

“Ok, baby, ok.  It’s ok.  I know what you thought,” he said as he tried and failed not to rub his hand up and down her back.  “I promised I would stay, and I did.  If you know what’s good for ya, you would’ve let me go, but I’m here.”

“I know what’s good for me.”

After a moment they got up off the floor, and Steve paced around.  Kayla watched him from the couch not quite knowing what to say.  She was aching to talk about Shane, but she decided to just let him go at his own pace.  For now. 

“So I hear you had a bad day,” Steve said from where he now stood in the kitchen.

Kayla rubbed at her lip.  “You heard what I said to Roman?”

“Hard not to.  Your lip still hurt?”

“Does yours?”

Steve chuckled.  “Yeah.”  He opened the cabinet and found the Advil right where he remembered it.  He gave Kayla two and handed her a glass of water.  When she was done he popped in two of his own and did the same. 

“Isn’t it supposed to be the other way around?” Kayla asked lightly.

“Physician wasn’t healing herself, so …”  He sank down onto the other end of the couch from her, and after a moment they both got somber again.  “I’ve had a really bad day, too,” he said, looking right at her.  She nodded.  “I don’t want us to be like this, Kayla, I really don’t.”

“Then let’s fix it,” she pleaded.

“You need to give me time, baby.  I need a little time.”

“We need to deal with Shane,” she said quietly.

Steve nodded.  “But I can’t hear whatever you’ve got to say right now.  Not never, Kayla.  Just not right now.”

“I’m sorry for keeping it from you.  I was so –“

“I know.  I know you’re sorry, I heard what you said to your brother.”  The truth was that it about did him in listening to her cry like that.  It was like outside the fish market the other day, he wanted so badly to go to her.  Even though you’re mad at her? he asked himself.  Yes.

“But Kayla, I killed my father.  I killed him.”  Steve saw the look she was giving him and stopped her before she started.  “Don’t say you’re sorry, baby, ‘cause I’m not.  Can you live with that?”

“You’re not a killer.  You were protecting the people you love.”

“Kayla, can you live with it?”

“Yes,” she said.  “Can you?” 

Steve nodded his head and reached out to run his thumb across her bruised lip. “It’s not like he’s gonna stay dead.”  Steve got up and walked back into the kitchen.  He was still in his leather jacket, he’d made no attempt to get comfortable to this point.  He opened the fridge, grabbed some grapes, and popped them in his mouth.  “Baby, I see you starin’ a hole through me.  I know you want to talk about Shane, but I don’t wanna talk about it right now.”

Kayla looked him deep in the eye.  “Are you punishing me?”

“I’m just not ready, Sweetness.”  This time he wasn’t angry when he said it, and despite how he felt right now, he wasn’t going to use her pet name that meant so much to him that way again.  “You lied to me for three years about having a relationship with our brother-in-law.  I’m trying to get past it enough to let you tell me the details.  Until then, I’m not ready.”

Kayla accepted it and nodded.  Then she laid her head in her arms and tried to calm her mind down.

“I’m tired, baby, you need to let me sleep. Can you do that for me?”

She nodded again.  “Come on,” she held out her hand. 

“I know where it is,” he said, and then made his way up to the bedroom. 

None of Steve’s things were there, but he made do with what there was.  He noticed that Kayla did not follow him up right away, and he was grateful for the space.  When she finally came upstairs, Steve was laying on his back in nothing but his unbuttoned jeans and the sheet covering just his feet.  She got ready for bed very quietly so as not to wake him.

Kayla prayed for a nightshirt, but back then she had mostly nightgowns and frilly things.  She opted for a dark camisole and dark cotton underwear and got changed in the bathroom.  She saw that Steve had broken out a new toothbrush, and it made her smile that he remembered where she kept things even before they were married.  She let her fingers drift to her ring finger and absently played with the space that her rings usually occupied, missing them.  When she was done she turned out the light and wasn’t sure what to do next.  She pulled the sheet and comforter up over her husband and then nervously sat on the edge of her side of the bed. 

“You don’t have to hide from me, Kayla.”

She startled.  “I thought you were asleep.”

“No.”

“I wasn’t hiding, I was … just …” she trailed off, not knowing what to say.  Steve didn’t say anything more, and she didn’t move from where she was on the other side of the bed.  Finally, she asked in a tone barely above a whisper, “Do you want me to sleep on the couch?”

Steve finally opened his eye and turned his head to look at her.  “No,” he said.  He lingered his gaze on her a moment longer, then he turned his head back and closed his eye again.

With a small measure of relief, Kayla got under the covers.  She laid on her side facing him, but then thought better of it and turned to her back.  “Goodnight, Steve,” she said.

“Goodnight,” he replied. 

It took quite some time for her brain to shut down enough so that she could fall asleep.  Finally, she was about to nod off when she felt Steve hold her hand, lacing his fingers with hers.

“I am mad at you.”  He said calmly.  “Doesn’t mean I don’t love you.”

She brought his hand up to her lips and kissed it. Then she returned their clasped hands to the space between them.  “I love you, too.”

Kayla fell asleep knowing they had a long way to go but also knowing they were going to get through it. 

Steve was awakened by what felt like a hard punch in the stomach.  His eye snapped open, but he was so disoriented that he couldn’t make sense of what the clock was saying, which was 4:47 in the morning.  Where am I?  Kayla was asleep beside him; she’d draped her arm over him in the night.  The loft.  Duke … Shane … Then it happened again.  It wasn’t a punch in the stomach but a familiar pull at his diaphragm.  “Shit.”  He tried to reach for Kayla, but she was already falling away.  “Kayla, wake up!  Kayla!”  She didn’t rouse more than a sleepy moan before he felt himself slip away. 

In the next moment he sucked in his breath hard and immediately started hacking up the dust and tiny debris particles that he’d inhaled.  It was dark, the air was hot, and he was, frankly, claustrophobic.  That’s when he felt her.  Kayla was in the exact spot he’d just left her in, laying right next to him to his right.  She wasn’t moving when he jumped away, and she wasn’t moving now, either.  When his lungs expelled most of the dust and his coughs settled, his eye adjusted to the light, and he realized with utter dismay where they were.  Mike Horton’s lab had just exploded, and a building was now leveled on top of them.  “Well this just keeps getting better and better.”

Chapter Text

Find Me
Chapter 52

Steve and Kayla were covered in dust as the building that once housed Mike Horton’s lab was laid waste around them.  The dust caked every inch of Steve’s now torn black tank top, leaving a fine layer of sooty debris over his skin.  His lungs were aching from the hacking coughs that rattled his body when he’d arrived into it. 

The first thing Steve noticed was Kayla laying in his arms.  No looking around this time trying to figure out where she was.  He was pretty sure he jumped first, but he couldn’t really be sure, so which Kayla this was he didn’t know.  He took a good look around and, more importantly, a good look above them; it didn’t seem like any progress toward their rescue had been made at this point. 

Time had stood still when they went through this before, and they only knew they’d spent a full day down there after having been rescued.  Now was no different.  His arrival into this body was well into their ordeal under the rubble, but he had no way of gauging that. All he knew right now was that the air was thin down there, his eyes stung from the tears this body had been previously crying, and he was holding Kayla tightly in his arms as she called out to him from her unconscious delirium.

They were in trouble. 

Steve was still deeply affected by what had happened on the previous two jumps and brought that with him into this one.  It wasn’t going to just go away, but he couldn’t help but put it on hold as the gravity of their current situation took hold of him.  He instinctively held Kayla closely against him as she whimpered and cried.  That’s all it took for his anxiety to spike, because he couldn’t stand to see her like this.  In any time and beneath all emotions, he just couldn’t stand to see her damaged.

“Kayla?  Baby, you in there?” Steve rasped, still recovering from having expelled the dust from his lungs. 

He ran the back of his hand down her cheek and saw the dust caked in her eyelashes.  She was drifting in and out of consciousness, her fever having taken hold of her by then, and it all started to come back to him. The poker game, Kayla insane with fear, Steve thinking he was going to lose her, his scouting missions.

Get her fever down.

“Kayla, come on, baby, which one of you do I got in there, huh?  Come on talk to me.  Can ya talk to me?”  Steve was feeling smothered.  He needed the open air, and seeing her like this only made his own angst worse.  “You listen to me, now, I’m not mad anymore,” which was not quite the truth, “so you just wake up now.  Kayla!  Dammit!” 

It was just like the poisoning!  Why were they constantly being thrust into one dangerous situation after another with one or both of them in trouble?  Would it be too much to ask for them to jump into their honeymoon for a goddamn change?!  Steve groaned as he started to register pain on the right side of his face.  He reached up and felt the blood that had started to clot.  “Great what’s one more scar, huh?”  He was so aggravated at having jumped here.  Now they both needed saving, and there wasn’t a damn thing he could do about it other than shout at the top of his lungs and wait for her to wake up.  This time it was up to him to keep it together.  She saved your ass last time, he reminded himself unsolicited.  “Shut up!” he yelled out loud.  She did.  You pulled that trigger without thinking it through, and she’s the one who kept you from imploding.  He didn’t want to hear it, but his mind kept throwing more at him.  How many times did she save you from yourself?  Flying to the next continent to be your nursemaid and sticking by you when you had the Dimeras in your head.  His frustration was boiling fast, and his emotions were a chaotic mess.  Unfortunately, this wasn’t the time or the place to deal with them.  He had to just leave them on the buffet like so many other times before and focus on the here and now.  And who knew such a small cut on the cheek could hurt this bad?  Now man up and fix her. 

He tried rousing her one last time, but Kayla continued not responding to Steve other than a whimper here and there.  “Ok, baby, ok,” he exhaled.  “I need to get some water in you.”  He swallowed the grit in his throat.  “In both of us.  You stay here, I’ll be back, ok?”

Steve started to gently slip his arm out from underneath her.  He grazed her leg with his as he tried to position her, and she screamed out with pain. 

“What?!  Baby, what?!” 

“Leg!  My leg,” she cried.  He’d forgotten about the gash on her leg that he’d dressed to the best of his ability and was now infected. 

“Oh baby, I forgot,” he said bending to kiss her forehead, “I’m sorry.”

Then she spoke a bit more coherently.  “Am I dreaming?  Am I dreaming?”  Now he knew which Kayla he had.  And this very version of her had said those same words to him just a few short hours ago in a year that was almost half a decade away, and it froze Steve right where he was.  He’d pushed down all the emotions and all the heartbreak that followed those words when he woke up in this lab explosion.  Now they all came rushing back up to the surface, and his face flushed a heated red under the coating of soot .  Jumping here only exacerbated what was already roiling within him, and for a moment, he felt the anger and hurt; for a moment, he felt the hatred for his father.  For a moment, he wanted to push Kayla far away, yet hold her close and hear her say she loves him and only him.  For a moment, he felt completely and utterly betrayed that she kept such a big secret from him and allowed himself to feel the jealousy that had threatened to consume him from the moment he spotted them on the pier.  And for a moment, he thought the weight of the world would threaten to crush him.

Only …

This wasn’t that Kayla yet. 
This wasn’t that time.
They weren’t safe.
He loved her more than life, itself.
He knew in his heart she felt the same.
And he was … lonely.

“I heard you say you love me,” Kayla moaned in a half-conscious whisper.  He could hear the wonder in her voice – how she’d dared to hope it could be true – and remembered how he’d tried to deny it to her and to himself for so long.  She opened her eyes and his heart clenched as he watched her try and fail to focus on him.  “Did you say you loved me, Steve?” she asked.  “Did you say that?”  She fought through that fog in her head to get those words out.  “Did you say that you loved me?   Steve?  Did you say that?”

The hurt wasn’t going to go away so easily, but the anger mercifully drained out of him as his wife lay in his arms begging him to love her. 

He hadn’t thought of this time in years.  Now he remembered the panic that shot through him that she might die thinking he didn’t love her.  That she might die not knowing that she was everything to him and that there was nothing he wouldn’t do for her.  He called up the memory of him shouting to her that he’d die for her.  That that was how much he loved her.  And that had not changed in 20 years.

“Yeah, Sweetness,” he said in soft, soothing tones, “Yeah, that’s exactly what I said.”  He placed a kiss on her temple and felt his own comfort in holding her against him.  A comfort this Kayla was not going to understand, but then she didn’t have to.  “I said it ‘cause it’s true.  You can’t possibly know right now how much I love you, but you will, baby, you will.”  He felt Kayla smile, her face smeared with dirt against his chest.  “And I would still die for you, baby,” he whispered “I still would.”

Kayla’s smile started to fade as she fought to stay conscious.  “I must be dreaming.”

“Shh, baby, don’t talk.  Don’t talk right now.”

But she didn’t really hear him as the effects of going into shock were overtaking her.  “If I'm dreaming,” she whimpered softly, “I don't want to ever wake up.”  Then Kayla’s soft whines finally stopped as she fell back into unconsciousness. 

Steve gently removed his arm and leaned up on his side.  Kayla was so pretty that night in her black and white dress.  He chuckled a bit noting how she would look at it now and wonder what she was thinking.  “You would hate that bow, Sweetness,” he said out loud. 

I am mad at you.  Doesn’t mean I don’t love you.  They were the last words she’d heard him say before he jumped.  He dragged his hand down his face and gave in to where he was.  He didn’t have the time to wallow in the hurt that was lingering within him, he had to focus on finding … whatever he could find to help them until Jack and the others discovered them.  The problem was he didn’t know when that would be, though the gummy texture of the blood on his cheek told him that they’d been down there quite a while already.

With the side of his face throbbing, Steve set off to find at least some water, maybe something to clean out Kayla’s wound.  And he’d pay double for an aspirin.  It wasn’t a very large space to move about in, but he was able to navigate around the inordinate amounts of broken glass to find a couple bottles of water, some rubbing alcohol, a box of Kleenex, and a random assortment of other items that would do them no good.  Then he scooted his way back to Kayla, who was still passed out where he’d left her, with his payload in his arms.

“Lookie what I found, huh?  Same as last time.” he said, shaking the alcohol bottle.  His head started to pound from the pain in his cheek, and he really just wanted to lay down and sleep.  “Nah, no sleep for Steven Earl Johnson, gotta take care of Mrs. Johnson,” he said to her oblivious form.  He sat up against a fallen beam and positioned her between his legs so that she lay against his chest.  Then he poured out the alcohol on some Kleenex in front of her and started to wipe her down. 

“You don’t know you’re Mrs. Johnson yet, do ya?” he said out loud.  “No, you’re still trying to get through this thick head of mine these days.”  The smell of the alcohol took him back to how desperate he felt when he wiped her down that first time.  He seemed to recall her being somewhat awake and reacting to the soothing feeling of it last time, but this time she was out. 

So, you’re glad I didn’t give up? she said in his head.

“Of course, I am,” he said to her like this was a conversation.  “I just didn’t know how to let you love me back then.”

I guess you figured out how.

“Yeah,” he replied as he poured some more alcohol out on the wad of Kleenex and gently wiped down her neck.  “I figured out how.”

Now that you know about Shane, do you have to figure out how to love me again?  Steve stopped his hand from moving for a moment as this imaginary conversation came to him from somewhere deep inside himself.  Then he continued, moving the Kleenexes to her forehead. 

“Letting myself love you isn’t a problem anymore, Kayla.  It’s figuring out how to understand why you kept it from me.  How could you not tell me?  What did you think, that I wouldn’t be able to handle it?”  A tear stung his eye.  “You could have told me, Kayla!” he raised his voice to her still form.  “You could have!  But you kept me in the dark!”  He realized he was yelling and took a breath that wasn’t as deep as he would have liked in the thinning air.  He took a long drag on the water bottle then screwed the cap back on.  “I’m sorry, I’m tryin’ not to yell, here, I really am.”  Then he moved her hair aside and continued with the back of her neck.

“I thought it was some random guy in LA.  Maybe a doctor.”  He smirked at the thought of the comfort that two doctor’s salaries could have brought her.  “But Shane?  And Kim knew?  Everyone must have known, Kayla, but no one filled me in.  Even Bo never said a word to me, and believe me, he’s gonna hear about it, too.  He wasn’t just family, Kayla, he was my friend.  Someone should have told me.  You should have told me.”

The alcohol was being absorbed by the Kleenex and not transferring very well to her skin.  He vaguely remembered tearing strips from her slip all those years ago, so he tossed the wad of Kleenex and did the same here.  Lifting her dress high on her thigh to reveal the slip, he awkwardly reached down to rip more off from where a strip had already been ripped to create the bandage on her leg.  He saturated it with the alcohol, and that worked much better, evoking soft moans from his wife.

“I thought we had no secrets, baby,” he said softly as he swept the material across her collarbone.  “I poured my heart out to you in Stockholm and told you one of the hardest things I’ve ever said to you.  Maybe the hardest.  It felt like I was cheating, Sweetness,” his voice starting to tremble with the guilt he still felt over the women he’d slept with when he didn’t know who he was.  “You forgave me so quickly it was almost worse.  You could have told me then and it still would have been better than finding you on the pier after I escaped from Alamain, Kayla.  You don’t know what it did to me, you don’t know.”  He rubbed quickly at his eye with the back of his hand, then kissed her head.  “Baby, it was 16 years for you, but it was like the next day for me.  It was like I woke up the next day and found you there with him.  I feel everything like I’m still 35 years old.  I look at myself and I say who the fuck told you to go and turn 50, dude?!  But then there I am, my whole life stolen from me.  For you, Shane happened a lifetime ago, but it was just the other day for me.  I need you to see that.  ‘Cause I miss you Sweetness.  I hate feeling this way.  I don’t know – how – to – feel this way – about you.  It’s all wrong, baby, it’s all wrong.”

Just then, Kayla inhaled sharply.  Steve stopped what he was doing and called to her, as it seemed she’d arrived.  But she didn’t really rouse.  Just started moaning a bit, still more or less passed out against him.

“Are you there?” he asked as he slid the back of his hand down her face.  “You’re due to wake up any minute, here, baby, so how ‘bout you open those eyes.”  When she didn’t comply, Steve opened the bottle of water and placed it against her lips, trying to coax her to drink it.  “Saved some for ya,” he said.  She didn’t respond, so he drank it down himself.  “Fine, be that way, I’ve got another one here with your name on it.”  He poured some more alcohol on the strip of material and worked it over her forehead, being careful to not get any in her eyes.  He felt the weight of her against him and he craned his neck to kiss her temple.  He missed her so much.  “I do love you.  And I need you to wake up now, Sweetness.  I’m gettin’ tired of talkin’ to myself.”

Just then a new wave of debris started to rain down on them.  He was not in a good position to cover her, so he did the best he could with his arms as a new layer of dust settled upon them.

Somewhere beneath the haze of a very heavy, deep sleep, Kayla began to feel the effects of the jump.  She wasn’t sure if she was dreaming or if it was real, her surroundings just felt so thick.  Like she was moving through a jar of honey.  Steve was there, she could hear him talking, but she was dizzy and couldn’t figure out what he was saying.  She continued to move slowly toward his voice.

“Hey, hey!” Steve shouted at the top of his lungs as it continued to rain concrete.  “We’re down here!  How long till you find us this time, BillyJack?!  Come on!”

“Steve?” Kayla said softly.

He closed his eye to the sound of his name on her lips.  He didn’t need Stockholm, he knew it was her just from the sound of her voice.  

“Hey baby,” he said calmly.  “It’s me.”

“You went first?”

“Yeah.”

She didn’t remember the jump, and that scared her.  As did their current surroundings.  It was dark, she was cold, the air was hot, and the smell of alcohol permeated her nostrils.  On the plus side, she felt Steve planted securely behind her.  Even so, she had no clue where she was.  “Where … what is …”

“Mike’s lab,” Steve said.  Still 1987. 

“Mike’s lab?”  Then it hit her.  “The explosion.  Oh ... that’s … great,” she said as she felt the stab of pain in her leg to drive it home.  “Fantastic.”

Steve let out a pfft then unscrewed the bottled water and handed it to her.  “You need to drink this, Sweetness, you’re body’s in shock.”

Kayla turned her head to look up at him.  “Don’t you want to ask me about Stockholm?”

He pushed her hair back off her forehead.  “Don’t need it, baby, I know it’s you.”

Kayla sighed and coughed up some dust.  “I don’t remember the jump.”

“You were sleeping.”  Kayla looked at him with surprise.  “I felt it in my sleep and woke up.  I wasn’t sure if you were still there when I jumped, but I figured it out when I got here.”  Kayla got a sad and solemn look on her face, and he knew she thought he jumped without telling her.  “I tried to wake you, to tell you I was jumping, but I was already too far gone and couldn’t get through to you.”

“You did?”

“Kayla, I wouldn’t leave without …”  Then he remembered how he’d let her jump from the pier.  Kayla saw him make contact with that truth before looking away from her.

“I shouldn’t have done that,” he said softly.  “I was—“

“I know.  It’s ok.”

Steve turned back to her and they locked eyes.  Kayla saw a warmth there, but still a distance, too.  She started to get dizzy and turned her head back straight to lean back against him.   Steve reminded her to drink, and she took a sip.

We’re jumping in our sleep now?  she thought to herself.  That scared the crap out of her. 

“Steve, if we wake up in a whole new place from when we went to sleep, then we’ll have no idea who jumped first or how long we’ve been there.”

He heard the fear in her voice, and in all honesty, he felt the same way.  “Yeah, but think about it, that’s not new.  The very first time we jumped it was in our sleep, remember?  We went to bed at home and woke up at the loft.  I think all these other times we just happened to be awake.  Will you please drink this water, you need it.”

“What about you?”

“Already had mine.”

“You had cuts and scratches, I remember.”

“I’m fine,” he said in no mood to be coddled.  “This is the first time you’ve been awake since I jumped in, so drink it up, come on now.”  Kayla relented and downed half the bottle. 

Several minutes passed in silence as they lost themselves in their own thoughts.  Steve continued to apply the alcohol to her skin in an effort to get the fever down.  She didn’t question him, she knew why he was doing it, she could tell she had a fever.

“So how long have you been here?” she asked Steve.

“I dunno, maybe half an hour now.” 

Kayla nodded.  Not too long apart this time,” she said quietly.

“Hard to know how long it was before we arrived, though.”  She felt cooler to him, so he put down the strip and let the alcohol quickly dissipate.

“We weren’t together here,” she said trying not to sound sad.

“I know,” he replied calmly, “I remember.”

Worry about jumping while asleep still tugged at her, but she realized he was right about it not being new.  “I guess there’s no point in worrying about when we jump,” she said resignedly.  “We’re going to go wherever we’re going to go, and we can’t stop it.”

“And we always have the Stockholm question.”

“And home base.”

“Actually, baby, we don’t really have that.” 

Kayla looked back up at him.  “Why?”

“What are we gonna do if I don’t live there, break in and park our ass in the corner until the other one shows up?  Might get away with it if Sweet Thing is in the picture, but if we’re already living in the house, or …” he took a deep breath.  “… later… after they’ve taken me …”  Steve let the thought die on the vine but felt Kayla tense up at the reference to the very thing they were continuing to not talk about.  

The silence was awkward and filled with all kinds of things they each wanted to say but didn’t know quite how to start.  Finally, Kayla spoke.

“I love you.”  She took his hand in hers and brought it to her chest.  “Please tell me you know that.”

“I do know that.”  He rearranged himself quickly while gently positioning her so that they were facing each other.  Talking to her earlier helped him start to get some things off his chest, and he felt like now he was ready to hear what she had to say.  So, if they were really going to have this conversation, then he wanted her to look him in the eye.  “Your leg ok?”

“Yeah,” she nodded.  She was nervous. 

“I do know that,” he said.  “So why couldn’t you tell me about him, Kayla?  Why did you have to hide it from me for three years?  I know we haven’t had an easy time of it for all three of those years, but I can pick out more than a few moments that you could have chosen to tell me.”

“I know,” her eyes started to water, “I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be sorry!  Explain it to me!”

Now that the moment was finally upon her to come clean and lay it all out for him, she didn’t know where to begin.  “I … when …,” she stammered.

“Kayla?  We have nothing but time right now.  Start from the beginning.”

“The beginning?” she laughed.  “The beginning.  Steve, it was more an end.  Like the last tragic act of a Shakespearean play.  I really was broken.”

“I don’t wanna hear you say that, Kayla.”

“Steve, please let me get this out.”  He put a hand up and acquiesced.  “When you died – when I thought you died,” she continued, “Steve, I wanted to die, too.  I just didn’t want to go on.  When you flatlined and they didn’t bring you back, I thought this just couldn’t be happening.  And ya know what, I knew it was coming.  I saw the monitors, and I knew what the readings meant, and I couldn’t figure out what had gone wrong so fast.  And you knew it, too.  You said goodbye to us all, and I was in denial up until the very moment Marcus made me leave you all alone in that room.  You were still so warm.  I couldn’t believe you were dead, how could you be so warm?” she said as unshed tears pooled in the rims of her eyes.  Steve hated seeing her affected like this.  No matter how upset he could ever be at her, it affected him to see her like this.  But he didn’t say anything and let her go on.  “I even thought I saw your pulse in your neck, but the monitors said otherwise.”  Kayla smirked with a mirthless laugh.  “I was beyond solace.  I didn’t spend a moment by myself from that time onward, because I simply couldn’t function.”

“You got over me fast.” It was out of his mouth before he could stop it.

“That’s not true, dammit.  That’s your jealousy talking, and I am tired of you throwing it in my face!”  Steve looked away and steamed in silence, even though he knew it wasn’t fair.  “I never got over you!  Not for one moment was I ever over you.  In fact, every day got worse not better!”

“But you never went back to live in the house!  You went right to Shane’s and you sold our house, Kayla!”

“Because I wasn’t strong enough to be there without you!  After the funeral, I tried to go back, but I was attacked right on our porch—“

“You were attacked?  You never told me that.”

“It was Lawrence Alamain’s men.  Shane was there and chased them off.”  Steve reacted to that, and Kayla put a hand on his arm.  “Steve, you have to let me tell this.  If you’re going to get upset every time I mention his name we’re never going to get through this.  Do you want to understand?”  He didn’t look at her.  “Do you?”

“Yes.” he said.  They paused for a moment, and when a tear slipped over her eyelashes Steve wiped it away.  “Ok, so go on.  All you’d said before was that you were in danger from them, you never said they actually attacked you.”

“Yeah, well, they did.  And I had a baby girl to take care of, I couldn’t risk her life, too.  Nowhere was more secure than Shane’s house, so everyone convinced me to go there.  Marcus wanted us to stay with him, but—“

“Marcus was our best friend, you should have gone there!”

“Be careful what you wish for, Steve Johnson.”  The look on her face made Steve very, very uncomfortable.  It was the last time he would interrupt her.

“We went to stay with Shane, and right after that is when I went with him and Jack to go find Jennifer in Lawrence’s country.”

“That’s where you found the tapes?”

Kayla nodded.  “He’s so evil, Steve.  Even with those tapes, we couldn’t make anything stick until Jennifer’s rape trial …”

Steve saw her shift gears for a minute.  “What are you thinking about?”

“Jack.”

“What about him?”

“He apologized to me.  Did you know that?”  Steve shook his head.  “For raping me,” she let her tears flow now.  “He was desperate to find Jennifer, and he was feeling so much guilt over – I don’t know, his whole life’s choices, I think.  But we found ourselves both in Lawrence’s garden, and he said in case we died there, he wanted me to know that he was sorry for raping me and that he hoped I’d forgive him one day.”

Steve reached over and caressed her face.  Kayla took his hand and laid her cheek against it. “I haven’t thought about any of this in a really long time.”  Then she took his hand in hers and went on.  “Ya know, there was a cave-in there just like we’re in now?”  He did know, she’d already told him all about it, but he let her go on at her own pace.  “I thought of the lab explosion the whole time.  Remembering how much of a hero you were to me.”  She looked around and then back at him.  “Irony, huh?”  Steve chuckled.  “Looking back on it now,” she continued very quietly, “I can see that Shane was already showing feelings for me.  You were dead three weeks.  I didn’t see it then.  All I saw was my grief.”

“Where was Stephanie?”

“My folks.”  She tried to take a deep breath, but she didn’t get nearly enough of it into her lungs, and she started to gasp a bit. 

“Low deep breaths, Kayla, don’t panic.”  She nodded, and Steve tried to jostle some debris overhead to give them some more air.  He made some headway, but not as much as he’d have liked.  Now Kayla was calmer.  She wiped at her cheeks and went on.

“The first time I really noticed that Shane wanted to be more than my friend was at the holidays.  It’s the first time I let myself notice.  He gave Stephanie some Christmas gifts … there was a music box … and I could just see it in his eyes.  He was looking at me differently, and I wasn’t ready for that.  I pretended I didn’t see it, but it was there.”  She could see Steve not handling this very well, but it was all tumbling out of her now, and she had to get it out.  “I remember right after New Years telling Marcus how much I appreciated him.  That he still saw me how I really was … that I was Steve’s wife, that I was still married to Steve, while everyone else was pressuring me, seeing me as a single woman.” 

She paused here, not sure if she should truly burst his bubble about Marcus or not.  Ultimately, she decided to end all the lies and half-truths now.  “None of that lasted, though.  Because Marcus started to feel the same way Shane did.”  She waited for his reaction, but he sat rock still.  “They were going at it over me, and everyone was telling me I had to find someone to fill the void.  That I had to move on.  Even your mom encouraged me!  But all I wanted was you back.  I still wanted to die and join you wherever you were.  You were gone on October 23^rd, and it was only three months later, and I was more lost than I’d ever been.”

Steve was still back on the Marcus part.  “Marcus.  He—He was—in love … ?”

Kayla only nodded.  “He kissed me one time, but he knew it was wrong as much as I did, and it went nowhere.  We remained only friends.  He was a rock for me, and you shouldn’t feel any differently toward him.  I owe him so much.”  Steve didn’t really know how to feel about this, and Kayla could see he was conflicted.  “Steve, you wanted honesty, so I’m giving it to you.  Marcus isn’t here to defend himself, and he was missing you, too.  Give him a break.” 

“Ok,” he sighed, tracing the strap of his patch over his forehead.  “I just … this is hard, Sweetness.  So, is that why you left the Emergency Center?  Because of Marcus?”

“No,” Kayla smirked, “That was my biggest mistake, leaving that place.  Marcus begged me to stay.  But Bo had that virus Lawrence had developed, and he was dying.  The hospital wanted me to run the Immunization Clinic, so I felt like it was my only choice.  But I made one terrible decision after another, and it all started with leaving that Emergency Center, the only thing I had left, other than Stephanie, where I felt you with me. 

“What do you mean the only thing you had left?”  He wasn’t sure he liked the sound of that.

“I couldn’t think of you, Steve.  If I did, I’d break down.  Every time.  I had to remove anything that made me think of you.  But that was so hard, ‘cause everything made me think of you.”

“Kayla, you’re stronger than that.”

“No, I’m not!  I might be now, but I sure as hell wasn’t then.  The first thing I did was get rid of all my clothes.”

“What?”

“My whole wardrobe.  I replaced the whole thing.  I didn’t realize it right away, it was just a little bit at first.  But then very quickly I just packed up the entire thing and replaced every single piece of clothing I owned.”

“Baby, why?”

“’Cause I saw you in every piece!  I’d try to put something on, and I would remember the last time I wore it with you.  I didn’t have a thing that didn’t remind me of you.  Not a blouse, not a sweater, not a skirt, not a nightgown didn’t remind me of you.  Not a sock.  Not a single pair of underwear.  I either kissed you in it or let you bleed on it, or made love to you after you took it off of me.  I couldn’t function, I’d start sobbing every time I tried to get dressed in the morning.  I had to replace it all.”

“God, Kayla.  What about your wedding dress?”

She shot him a look that said, duh and was a little offended, too.  “Give me a little credit, Steve, I wasn’t about to let that go, Stephanie might have wanted it, you know.”  Steve smiled sadly.  “I would never have let that go.  I kept the nightgown I wore the first time we made love, too.  And a couple other very special pieces to me.  But I couldn’t bear to wear them or even look at them ever again, so I packed them away in boxes, and they’re still in those boxes in the storage unit in LA.  The only thing I kept wearing was a robe.  The black one with the lace collar.  I wore it for years and years.  I don’t really know why, but I held on to that.”

Steve was so sad he could barely speak.  “And you cut your hair, too,” he said touching her face.  “You looked like a different person the other day.”

“Yeah,” she chuckled, “because I was a different person.  Every time I had to take some kind of big step, I’d cope by cutting my hair.  I saw Shane had feelings for me, I cut it shorter.  He kissed me, I lopped off another inch.  We almost slept together on more than one occasion, I’d cut another half an inch.”  She laughed a bit introspectively.  “When I was a med student in my psych rotation I learned that that was a common coping mechanism.  She ran her hand through her hair and let it linger at her ends.  “I didn’t realize what I was doing, but in the span of a year I went from hair longer and straighter than you’ve ever seen it,” she held her palm out parallel with her breast to show him just how long, and Steve was surprised, “to this close-cropped cut that you almost couldn’t tell I was a girl.”

Steve smiled.  “No one would ever think you weren’t a girl, Sweetness.”

“Trust me on this one, it was not a feminine cut.”

“Your hair’s pretty short now – back home, I mean.”

“Way shorter.” 

He smiled.  “You’ll have to show me a picture.”

“This wasn’t about fashion, Steve, don’t you get it?  It was destructive.  Everything I was doing was destructive, lashing out, trying to cope with your death.”  Stephanie spent almost as much time with my parents as she did with me.  It was insane.  I was insane.  She looked down, unable to meet his eye.  “The things I did, Steve … I’m so ashamed, there’s no other word for it.  I’m still so ashamed of it I can’t … I can’t …”

Steve tipped her chin up.  “Look at me, Kayla.”  She moved her chin away and averted her eyes, so he tried again.  “Sweetness, look at me.”  Only when he called her that did she do so.  “There is nothing you can’t tell me.  We’ve been through Marina.  We’ve been through …,” he dared to say it, “Ava.”  He saw her eyes waver, and he made a note to himself that she still bothered her, but he went on.  “We’ve been through Jack and my father.  The brainwashing, and 16 years of separation.  My heart is bonded to you, don’t you know that by now?  Don’t you see that’s why this hurt me so bad?  Kayla, do you really think there’s anything in this world that you can say to me that will make me think less of you?”

“Maybe,” she squeaked out.

“No, Kayla!  There’s no maybe!  There’s nothing!  It might be hard to hear, and it might be hard to get through. But there’s nothing you need to keep a secret from me, Kayla.  You’re the one who taught me that.” 

“That’s the problem!  You put me on this – this – this pedestal.”

Steve balked. “I don’t.”

“Yes, you do!  When you came back, I couldn’t believe I was getting this second chance.  And when you got your memories back and you’d really come back to me, I was so scared you’d go away again.  I had to protect us.  From the things I’d done.  I just couldn’t bear to chip away at that.”

“You’re wrong, baby,” he insisted.  “You’re plain wrong.”

“No, I’m not.  And that’s why I didn’t tell you, because the whole story is ugly.  I did things that if the shoe were on the other foot that I don’t know if I could forgive.  The things I did to Kimberly.”  Kayla’s tears began again at the memory of the damage she’d done to that relationship with her sister.  It took years in LA together to repair that.  “And the things I did to you.  I took off your ring too quickly,” she cried.  “It was too hard to see it.”

“You needed help, baby.”  His heart had started to ache.

“Yeah, well it took one mistake after another to figure that out!  Until then, I just kept making them!  And to make it worse, Kim was dating the man that killed you!”

Steve’s face took on the shock that all of the Brady’s went through as it was happening 18 years before.  “She what?  Kayla, are you telling me that Kimberly was … sleeping with Lawrence Alamain?”

“Yeah,” she huffed.  “That’s exactly what I’m telling you.”

“You told me Kim and Shane never got back together, but you never said Alamain had anything to do with it!”

“Believe me, she’s not proud.  It started out as an ISA mission, but it didn’t turn out that way.  And, of course, she got hurt in the end.  But in the meantime, it sent me over the edge.  You have no idea what kind of emotional trauma I went through seeing her with him.  The betrayal.  It was so bad I didn’t know how to deal with it.  And the whole time Shane was trying to get closer to me, I was lost and lonely and damaged …”

“You’re not damaged, goddammit!”

“You have to stop seeing me as perfect, Steve!”

“I don’t!  I don’t see you that way at all, I see you as the woman I love!”

“Well, I have flaws just like everybody else.  And trust me, I was completely damaged.  I should know, I was the one who was there!”  That cut Steve to the core, and he let out a pained sound.  Kayla put her face in her hands and cried.  She just kept hurting him.  “I’m sorry,” she whimpered. 

“Go on,” he urged.

“I’m so sorry, Steve.”

“What happened next, dammit!”

Kayla swallowed down his rebuke and continued.  “Shane was there, and I let him in,” she sobbed.  “Every little decision got harder and harder to make.  But Shane was there.  He swooped in right away to take care of me, brought us to his house, and he was just as damaged from Kim leaving him.  I saw him falling in love with me, and I let him, because if I hadn’t, then I would have shriveled up and died having to face life without you.  And Stephanie needed me!  I wasn’t strong enough to do it, so I let Shane in.” 

Kayla saw the mixture of sadness, jealousy, and pity on her husband’s face, and she felt very small.  But she went on.  “You still want to hear the things I did?”

“Yes!”

“Ok, I broke about a million hospital rules.  I tampered with Bo’s blood sample when he was sick, switched it with my own, and I don’t even have a good reason why.  It eventually got me fired.”

Steve looked her right in the eye.  “I still love you.  What else?”

“I took my rings off.”

“You already told me that.”

“‘Til death do us part’ or not, I still felt married to you.  But I thought if I did, it would make things better.  I’d be able to move on.  So, four months after you died, that was all I could bear before I took them off and let Shane start to fill the void.”

“I still love you, Kayla.” He was openly crying.  “What else?”

“I let Lawrence Alamain get to Kim.  I let him manipulate her, and I couldn’t save her from it.  I didn’t try hard enough!”

“I still love you.  Keep going.”

“I saw my sister hurting when Shane pursued me.  I saw her crumble when she caught us kissing.  I saw her die a little bit when she found out we’d s-s-slept together.”  Steve reacted to that.  “But I felt betrayed by her being with the man that killed you, so I encouraged him.  I flirted with him.  I seduced him as he seduced me.  And I told Kim she was a bad sister for being upset about it.”

“I still love you,” he cried softly.

Kayla’s cries were not as soft.  “I found out that Jeannie was really Shane’s daughter and not Cal’s.  And I kept that information from him.  I kept a father from his little girl.  My sister’s little girl.  So that he would love my little girl more.  So that he would stay with me.  So that I wouldn’t have to face you not being there.”

This one did shock him.  And the thought of Shane raising his daughter, holding her when she’d wake up in the night, watching her first steps, being a father to her … It was almost more than he could take. 

“You’re right, baby,” his voice broke.  “That’s – not like you at all.  And you win that one, it was a terrible thing to do.”  Then he leaned close so that he was inches from her face.  “But you don’t scare me.  I still love you.  What else?”

“I had sex with Shane.”  She barely got it out, and Steve finally tore himself from her gaze.  She saw the fire in his eye before he did.  “I told him I loved him.  I told him to make love to me.  I told him I wanted to spend the rest of my life with him.  I saw what it did to Kimberly and my pop and my whole family.  I saw it split us all apart.  And I still told Kim that Shane was mine.  Can you believe that?  I told her that the love of her life was mine.  How could I do that, Steve?  How could I do that and still be the woman you love?”

It was like he’d been stabbed through the heart.  I told him I loved him.  I told him to make love to me.  I told him I wanted to spend the rest of my life with him.  He couldn’t breathe.  Kayla saw his reaction, and guilt swept through her.

“Steve …”

“Ok, you told me.  No more.”

Pain stabbed at her heart when he didn’t immediately say he loved her.  

“So, that hurt, then?  I hurt you?”  He tore his eye into her, and she felt just how much her words hurt him.  “And you wonder why I kept it to myself?”

“Yeah, I’m hurting!” he shouted.  “I never said it would feel like a walk in the park!  But I’m not going anywhere!  I’m still here, Kayla!  Your husband!  Loving you!  Just like I would have been if you’d told me in the first place!”

“I didn’t want to hurt you!”

“Too fucking late!”

Now Kayla was mad, too.  “Which is it, Steve?  Are you hurt because I lied about it, or is it because I moved on in the first place?”

“That’s not fair.”

“Oh, I think it’s very fair.”

“Picturing you with Shane hurts me more than you can know.”

“Oh, I think I know.  Nine times over, I know, Steve.”

Now it was Steve’s turn to feel small. 

“You can dish it out, but you can’t take it!  You slept with all those women –“

“I didn’t know who I was!”

“And I thought you were dead!”  Kayla’s leg was throbbing, and she wondered in the back of her head if this very loud conversation was going to draw people to discover them earlier this time.  “You know why I forgave you so quickly?  Because there was nothing to forgive.  You didn’t know who you were!”  Steve’s answer was to work the muscle in his jaw.  “But you being dead isn’t a good enough reason for me, it seems.”

“You’re being—“

“Honest?  Isn’t that what you wanted?  You know, I thought that moving on with someone else meant that I would have to give up loving you.  But Shane convinced me that it didn’t mean that.  That I could always love you, yet still be able to have this relationship with him, because he would always love Kimberly, too.  And I convinced myself of that for a while.  I imagined you were out there saying, ‘go for it, Sweetness.  Grab as much happiness as you can.’  Would you not want me to be happy?”

“Of course, I would.”

“Well, I forced myself to believe it, Steve.  Because feeling Shane’s arms around me made the pain go away.  I was in so much pain.  It consumed me.  I thought you were dead.  And my life felt over.  Every time I made love to him I convinced myself I wasn’t betraying you.”  She huffed out her disgust with herself.  “You feel like you cheated on me with those nine women.”  It was a statement not a question, but Steve nodded and told her he did, anyway.  “I felt the same way every time I was with him,” she whispered.  The first time I kissed him, I wanted it.  I wanted it so bad.  So that I could feel you there.  You kissing me, you holding me.  It never felt like that, though.”  She wasn’t looking at him anymore, she was staring off, and her voice took on an ethereal quality as she remembered it.  “I kept trying to feel you there.  I would close my eyes,” and she closed hers as she spoke, “and I’d imagine it was you.”  She touched her fingertips to her lips, then opened her eyes.  “And for a moment here and there, it was close enough that I could pretend.  But it always felt like I was cheating.  I lied to myself and said it wasn’t so, but it was. 

Steve took her hand from her lips and held it to his.

“I kept pursuing you but you were never there, and it was always Shane I ended up with.  And I felt like I was the bad girl.  Naughty.  But that’s not who I was.  I was your good girl, Steve.  I was your sweetness.  So, I had to be something with him that I wasn’t with you.  With him I had to be something that was not sweet.  Kimberly was the hooker, Kimberly was the naughty one.  So, I’d be that, the naughty girl that Shane liked.  That kept the real me – the one that belonged to you – yours.”

Of all the things Kayla had said to him under the concrete and rubble, this was what shattered him the most.  “Stop.”

“My clothes, my hair, my behavior, sex with Shane … I became a totally different person.  It wasn’t because of him.  He was just one in a long line of things I did wrong in a misguided attempt to focus on something else and get over you.”

“Please stop.”

“All of it, every bit of it, I did to try to get over you.  Not because I was over you.  And it never did work.

Steve couldn’t take another word.  “No more!  Please, baby, no more, I can’t hear any more!” 

“Do you see now?  All the terrible things I did?  Do you see why I didn’t tell you?  How can you forgive me for these things when I haven’t even forgiven myself?”

“BECAUSE YOU’RE MINE, KAYLA, THAT’S WHY!  BECAUSE YOU. ARE. MINE!  For better or for worse!  Forever!  And I meant that!  Dammit, baby!”  He sank his head into his hands, as the pain leached out of him and into the small space they were trapped in.  When he looked back up at her he saw how much she needed him.  “I meant that.  My heart is in pieces, here, baby, but those pieces still belong to you, Kayla.  And they always will!   

With a desperation that he’d been harboring since the moment he woke up on Alamain’s boat, Steve grabbed Kayla’s face and crushed his lips to her in a wanton, frantic kiss that both of them felt with base and fundamental need.  “I love you,” he cried into the kiss, “I still love you.  I’ll never stop loving you, Sweetness.”

Neither of them had needed to feel each other’s kiss more in their whole lives than at that very moment.  They both cried cathartic tears and their souls connected through each joining of their lips. 

When they finally broke away, Steve met her eyes again.  “Is that everything?”  His voice had an affected, troubled quality to it that he couldn’t help.

“That’s everything.  Kayla cried in relief, grief, guilt, and also joy.  “I’m sorry I hurt you,” she said as she threaded her hands through his hair.  “I’m so sorry.”

He held her face with his hands.  “You love only me,” he whispered.

She nodded and curled her fingers into his face.  “You’re the only one I’ve ever given my heart to.  The only one I’ve ever wanted.  I thought I loved him, too.  I was wrong.”

“I don’t ever wanna hear you think of yourself as something … dirty.  Never again, Kayla.  Ever.”

Kayla nodded and felt a surge of emotion for him so strong that she felt herself nearly explode she was so dizzy. “I’m your Sweetness, Steve.  Only yours.  I love you.”

Steve saw her sway and laid them down to hold her possessively against him.  “I love you, too.” 

They were both physically and emotionally spent.  Steve still felt the hurt, and Kayla still felt the guilt.  But there were no more secrets between them, and their healing had begun.

They laid there, holding each other in silence, allowing themselves to shed cathartic tears while they waited to be found.

Chapter Text

Find Me
Chapter 53

“Jack, please, will you stop fussing over me.”

“No, Kayla, I won’t.  You’ve been through a traumatic ordeal, and I’m going to make damn sure you get the very best of care.”

“I’m a nurse, Jack,” she said with barely restrained annoyance.  “At this very hospital.  I think I know the care I’m getting, so please.

Jack sat in the chair at Kayla’s bedside at University Hospital and tried to hold her hand, but she kept yanking it away and looking out the window of her hospital room door.

“Are you mad at me, Kayla?  Did I do something wrong?”

Kayla shot him a look like she couldn’t be bothered.  And that’s because she couldn’t.  “Jack, I’m not mad at you, I’m just waiting for Steve.”  And also trying to ensure that the opening in the back of her hospital gown was safely obscured against the back of her bed.

It had been an absolute whirlwind of activity the moment she and Steve had been brought out through that hole.  They’d been awakened by the sound of rescuers clearing debris, and Steve had made sure they were found again.  Just before the rope was lowered down to them, they looked at each other with a knowing sense of dread.  They knew they would be rescued, that was never actually a question.  But now that they’d found their way out of the darkness that had consumed them on their most recent jumps, both of them felt … delicate.  And somewhat uneasy with separation at this point.  They were stuck in these bodies at this time, so being treated for their injuries was unavoidable.  But the timing felt like an intrusion.  Laying closely with each other, even in the thinning air, was a healing act.  Their painful discussion about her life after Steve’s presumed death was like a balm on an open wound, and being together was the bandage ensuring that the wound healed.  The separation of rescue left their wound open to the elements.

“No, Jack, I’m not mad at you,” Kayla said rather unconvincingly.

“You sure about that?  You’re acting like you’d rather I wasn’t here.”

Kayla leveled the first really honest expression of this jump upon him.  “Ok, yeah, Jack, I am mad.  I’ve asked you to please go.  I’m fine here.”

“I care about you, Kayla. I don’t think you’re in any condition to be left alone.”

Kayla felt the years she had on him like a weight upon her shoulders.  The woman inside this body was so much older and wiser than this Jack sitting next to her.  She knew so much more about him and the people around her, and hearing him talk to her like he knew so much better was infuriating.

“Jack,” she said with her patience near its end, “it’s bad enough that Steve and I had to ride here in separate ambulances, now no one will tell me how he is or let me check on him, and all you’re doing is making it worse.”

“I’m sure he’s fine, Kayla.”

“Well, if you don’t mind, I’m going to get up and check on him myself.”  She gestured for him to leave, but he stood his ground.

“As a matter of fact, I do mind.  You’re not going anywhere.”

And that was the end of her fuse.  “Jack, I want you to go!” she yelled.  Jack was taken aback.  She’d never yelled at him before.  “I mean, it, go!  I can’t get out of this bed until you do, I’m a nurse, I’m fine.  I love Steve, start getting used to that, because it’s not going to change!  Now, I’ve been through a lot more than you know, so I’m not going to tell you again.  Please just leave!”  Jack looked wounded, but Kayla didn’t care. 

It was exactly what Kayla was afraid would happen.  A whole slew of people led by Jack had found them down beneath the rubble, just like last time.  And just like last time, Mike and Roman were barking orders, Kim and Shane looked on and lent a hand, Jo and Adrienne fussed and fawned over Steve when he’d been lifted out, Jack obsessed over Kayla’s well-being, Neil followed after Jack waiting for his Hotchkins disease to cause him to collapse, and Harper made very sure to tell all the reporters just how much of a hero Jack was.

Unlike before, however, Steve didn’t watch from the wings.  He didn’t keep his distance this time.  He was with her, holding her hand, acting like the husband no one realized he actually was, listening as the paramedics worked on her, all while shooing away the ones trying to work on him.  This meant that Harper had a much harder time getting the reporters to focus on Jack the hero when they had this mysterious guy emerging from the wreckage like he’s Thor, refusing to leave the senator’s son’s nurse’s side, and holding on to her like they were married or something.  And was that a kiss?  Did he just kiss her? 

He did.  Only the EMTs and massive throng of friends and family that had come to lend their support showed it a little too well for this second run through, because Steve and Kayla were entirely different people with different things happening beneath the surface that these people couldn’t possibly understand.  Interestingly, Shane’s presence didn’t even register on Steve’s radar, he was too busy trying not to separate from Kayla; and besides, the reporters were really quite good at monopolizing their attention.  Love Beneath the Rubble.  Now that was a story.  Then before either of them could protest, Kayla was whisked away, and Steve was treated separately. 

“I’ll find you, Kayla,” his green eye riveted on her before they dragged him from beside her gurney.

“Promise me, Steve.”

He knew she was insecure about everything that had happened.  And the truth was so was he.  “Don’t worry, I’m not leaving that hospital without you.  Just let them treat you, and I’ll find you, Sweetness, I promise.”

“Or I’ll find you,” she smiled.  “Kind of like last time.”

“This isn’t last time, Sweetness,” he said in no uncertain terms.

“Kayla, what is he talking about,” Jack said as he tried to take her hand.  Kayla saw Steve eye his brother as she removed her hand from his grasp. 

“Sir, please, you need to come with us right now,” the petite EMT said to him as she began dragging him away.

“Remember what I said to you down there,” Steve called out to her as his EMT extricated him from Kayla’s ambulance door.  “Don’t you doubt me.”  Kayla nodded.  Steve signed I love you, and she signed it back as they closed the doors and the ambulance disappeared down the street.

Now it was four hours later, and Kayla lay in the exact same hospital room as she’d been assigned the first time trying to convince Jack to leave so that she could avoid exposing herself to him in nothing more than her hospital gown. 

Kayla was feeling anxious as the IV antibiotic for her infection dripped into her.  She’d declined the sedative, though Mike Horton wasn’t thrilled about that, and now she just wanted to get up out of the bed and go find her husband. 

Jack tried not to react to Kayla’s verbal assault, but she could see that that last exchange had gotten to him.  “I don’t know what you see in the guy, Kayla,” he said with growing agitation.  “He’s always upsetting you.”

“Steve took care of me down there.  He’s kept me alive more times than I can count now.”

“Yeah, well, he doesn’t have any idea what’s best for you.”

“You’re one to talk.”

“What?”  Jack didn’t know where that came from.  But he was a tenacious man.  He sat down next to her right there on her bed and practically engulfed her as he encircled her shoulders with his arm.  Kayla recoiled.  She didn’t want him touching her.  She’d gone as far as she could in forgiving him and in 2009 their relationship was civil, and without issue.  But being touched by him, brought into an embrace?  Far too much for her liking. 

“Jack, please don’t!” she raised her voice as she wiggled out of his hold. 

The next thing she knew, Jack was being physically lifted away from Kayla.  And the person doing the lifting was Steve. 

“What the hell?!” Jack yelled as Steve let his lapels go.

“Kayla said no, Junior.  Didn’t you ever listen?  Didn’t you ever hear when a woman says no?”

That was a very loaded statement Steve made, and Jack didn’t like the sound of it at all.

“I don’t know what you think you’re talking about, Steve, but you don’t have any rights here!”

“I don’t have any rights?  And who are you, exactly?  Now you listen to me, Jack, ‘cause I’m only gonna say this once.  Kayla and I are together.  You don’t have to like it,” he spat.  “Now get out.”

Despite the large bandage on his cheek and the very non-threatening, green hospital scrubs Steve was now wearing, Jack could see that he was ready for a fight.  He looked to Kayla, but she wasn’t in his corner.

“Go home, Jack,” Steve said softly.  “Thank you for rescuing us.  But … it’s time to go.”

Without another word, Jack straightened his shirt, looked at Steve with disgust, and left.

Kayla was so relieved when Steve turned toward her.  His hair was damp, and he looked … so good.  “It’s been hours, Steve, I was worried.  Are you ok?”

“Told you I’d find you, didn’t I?” He sat down in the chair Jack had just vacated and stared at his wife, who was examining him carefully.  He pointed to the bandage above her eye.  “Stitches?”

“No,” she shook her head.  “It’s not bad.  What about you,” she asked, “are you in pain?”

Steve shook his head.  “Nothing a little pill couldn’t fix.” Steve eyed the IV hanging beside her.  “Probably giving you something a little stronger.”

“Shot of Demerol.  That’s just an antibiotic,” she said gesturing toward the IV.  Kayla hated this.  She hated how awkward they felt around one another.  They’d somehow taken a few steps back from the closeness they had in each other’s arms just a few short hours ago.  “Scrubs, huh?”

“Yeah,” he said running his hand through his drying hair.  “Found me a shower before they released me.” 

“So you’re signed out?”

“Yeah, Mama and Adrienne just left.  They were all over me,” he chuckled.

“Of course,” she smiled.

“Of course,” he repeated.

“I’m glad they were there for you.”

“Me, too,” he said.  If this were really back then he never would have said that out loud.  But her Steve of 2009 didn’t have any problems letting his mother and sister love him.  “They told me where to find you before they left.”

“How did they know?”

Steve grinned.  “Adrienne always was a pretty resourceful girl.”  Kayla nodded and smiled knowingly.  Neither one of them knew what to do with the silence that followed.  Steve didn’t know why he felt so apprehensive to touch her.  It was like that wall of uncertainty after their first jump.  “Mike told me you’re gonna be here at least overnight,” he finally said.  “That’s how it went last time, right?”

Kayla nodded.  “I think two total.  I don’t really remember that detail anymore.”

Steve wanted to hold her.  He wanted to feel her in his arms and feel the absolute truth in her love for him.  He knew she loved him, it’s not that he doubted it.  He just needed to feel it in their touch.  Before he knew it he’d stood up and pulled aside the blanket to get into bed with her, kicking his shoes off before he pulled the blanket back over them both.  He pulled her against him and kissed her gingerly as she lay her hand with the securely-taped IV on his shoulder.  Kayla sighed into his kiss.  She had sensed that wall, too, but now feeling him on her lips had made it dissolve away.  Mostly.  Steve’s arms were warm and strong, and her heart beat faster from his touch.

“Are we ok?” Kayla asked, breaking from their kiss, the hope in her voice breaking Steve’s heart a little bit.

Steve ran a knuckle down her cheek and nodded.  “We could never not be ok, Kayla.”

She looked into his bright green eye.  “I think we gave ‘ok’ a run for its money back there,” she said honestly.  “I can’t remember a time I ever felt more unsure of us.”

“Don’t say that, Kayla!  Don’t ever say that.”  He didn’t raise his voice, but the severity of his tone was unmistakable. 

“I damaged us,” she whispered.

“No,” Steve shook his head as he swallowed the lump that had jumped into his throat.  Then Steve kissed her again, so gently, so beautifully.

Kayla pulled her lips from his and ran her fingertips very softly against his cheek.  “I’m sorry,” she said.

Steve shook his head.  “Don’t.  No more, baby.  No more ‘I’m sorrys.’  I know you are.”  Then he tucked her own freshly washed blonde hair behind her ear.  “I am, too,” he said simply.

“No—“

“I took it hard.  I took it really hard, Sweetness.”

“I hurt you.”  There were no tears.  But her voice was thick with emotion.  Steve looked up and away from her like he always did when he didn’t want to acknowledge the truth but wouldn’t lie to her, either.  She palmed his face back to look at her and searched his eyes for forgiveness.  “I’m so sorry I hurt you.  I should have trusted you.”

“I was terrible to you, Kayla.  I said things I – didn’t mean.  Coming off that hellhole of a prison and seeing you on that pier –“

Kayla suddenly panicked and grabbed Steve’s wrist.  She turned it over and over.

“Honey, that was two or three jumps ago, this is 1987, remember?” 

Kayla shook the memory of his red, raw wrists away.  “Ugh, the jumps are blending in my head. 

“No scars, see?  No scars, that’s four years from now.”

Kayla laid her head on Steve’s chest as he stroked her hair.  “You escaped from that to see me kissing Shane, I understand why you reacted the way you did.  I’m just so sorry.”

“But Kayla, I’m sorry, too.  I was insane with jealousy and anger, and I’m hurting.”

Kayla looked up at him.  “You were angry, but you are hurting.  So you still hurt.”

Why did she have to be so damn perceptive?  Yes, he was hurting.  That wasn’t going away so easily.  It didn’t mean it never would.  He exhaled heavily.

“I guess I do, yeah.”  Kayla’s eyes watered, and Steve felt her heart break.  “But, baby, I promise you, we’re gonna be ok.  We’re gonna get over it, ok?  Look how far we’ve already come.”

“But … your father.”

“Got what he deserved, Kayla,” he said without hesitation, “he’s a sick bastard.”  Steve knew where she was going with this in her head – that she’s the one who made him kill Duke.  He had to set her straight right now, he was not going to let her feel guilty about this.  Those actions were his, no matter what led him to them they were his, and he alone would own them.  He wanted to own them.  “Baby, I admit that I probably did what I did because of what happened with us on that pier, but it was probably gonna happen anyway.  We were going to jump there whether I’d seen you on the pier with Shane or not.  I admit I didn’t think it through, but who knows what would have happened?  I love you no matter what, and the way he was looking at you … and Adrienne was out there …”

“You asked me if I could live with it, and I meant it when I said yes.”

“And so did I, so I don’t want you worrying that any of that was your fault.”  Steve held her tighter.  “I forgive you.  Please forgive me, too.”

Kayla nodded.  “I love you,” she said. 

“I love you, too, Sweetness.  I love you, too.”

“But the hurt.  I want the hurt inside you to go away, too.”

So did he.  “It will.  Give it time, baby, it will.” 

Steve wanted to make love to her.  He wanted to feel the deep connection to her that he always got when he was wrapped tightly inside of her warm home.  That wasn’t possible right now, though, so he found it another way instead.  Steve took her left hand in his, careful not to jostle the IV.  Then he kissed her ring finger where her engagement ring and wedding band rightfully belonged.  He let his lips linger there of several seconds.  “I do, Kayla.  For better or worse and all the other things I’ve ever vowed to you, I do.”

“Steve,” she whispered.  Then he kissed her ring finger again.  “I do, too,” she smiled, then did the same thing with his ring finger. 

“We haven’t done that in a few jumps, have we?”

“No.  I’m so glad we did.  Thank you.  I didn’t realize how much I needed to do that until just now.”

“Oh, baby,” he said with a deep, cleansing sigh.  “You were passed out when I got there.  It all came at me how bad it was.  You said something down there, and it just made me start talkin’.  Started letting out how mad I was”

“What did I say?”

“You asked if I’d really said I love you or if you were dreaming.  You hadn’t arrived yet, it was the other you.”

Kayla chuckled.  “Oh, I remember that.  I’ll never forget it.  It was the first time you’d said it, and when I heard it, I really didn’t know if I was making it up in my head or not.  Well, second, actually.”

“Second?”

“You’d said you loved me once before.  In your apartment.  You were mad at me then, too.”

That statement got to him.  “Kayla, people say all kinds of things when they think they’re gonna die.  Things they’re worried they’ll never get another chance to say.  I had to tell you back then, I was so scared you weren’t gonna make it.  And … I remembered that feeling this time, and it made me … it …” Steve was getting choked up.  Then he swallowed it down and lifted her chin to look at him.  “We are ok, baby.  I’m not gonna lie, there’s pain.  But you’re my wife.  I’m your husband.  And we’ll get through this.”  Kayla pulled him into another kiss, and this one he deepened despite himself, he wanted to feel her as deeply as he could.  Finally, they broke, and held each other as they started to doze.

Kayla hadn’t really fallen asleep, but she was drowsy as Steve’s measured breathing lulled her.  Which is why she did a double take when the nurse came into the room to check her vitals.  It wasn’t the older woman’s reaction to finding Steve in her patient’s bed; it was the fact that Ed Daniels was loitering outside of Kayla’s room.  This was a man she hadn’t seen or thought of in so long that she couldn’t actually call up his name in her memory, but his face was a lock.  She knew exactly who he was.  She used both Steve’s prone body and that of the upright nurse taking Kayla’s blood pressure as she smiled at the couple below her to obscure her gaze from the turned FBI man’s view.  But there was no doubt about it, he was there.  On the payphone that was, apparently, right outside her room.  Reporting to whomever was on the other end.  Watching them. 

Chapter Text

Find Me
Chapter 54

Linda Speakman had been a nurse at University Hospital a long time, just about as long as she’d been getting her perch at the Brady Fish Market.  She’d always known Kayla to be a kind, caring person whom everyone loved, even before she’d become a nurse.  So, Linda’s first reaction to seeing the man lying in her hospital bed with her was alarm.  But then she saw how the two held each other.  How they clearly loved each other.  She didn’t know exactly who this man was, but she had seen him around for some time now.  She didn’t know they were this kind of serious, but clearly they were.  It wasn’t the over the top, dramatic, cling that makes you embarrassed for them; it was something honest and pure she saw between them in that bed.  It was this beautiful kind of natural order.  The man’s imposing patch and obvious rough and tumble exterior didn’t fool her as he held her hand so gently to his heart, his fingers covering hers, carefully missing where the needle went into the vein in her hand.  Kayla’s head rested in the crook of his neck in a way that seemed like she’d been doing it for years; like it was meant to fit there.  There wasn’t a question in her mind that they were each other’s world, and although visiting hours were now over, she just didn’t have the heart to tell this young man to leave.  So, she didn’t. 

Kayla opened her eyes from her light doze when Linda applied the gentle pressure to her pulse point.  She smiled down at her colleague and whispered, “Didn’t mean to wake you, honey.”

“Oh, I wasn’t –“  Kayla stopped short, and Linda saw her attention lock onto something outside her door.  “—sleeping.”

“Need your other arm,” she said regretfully, and Kayla freed it for her from between she and Steve.  Linda wrapped the blood pressure cuff around her slender upper arm and began tightening it with several pumps.  She was still looking out that window in the door.  “You ok, Kayla?”

“Y—uh, yeah.  Why?”  She was completely distracted and didn’t even look at Linda as she said it.

“Because your blood pressure is 142 over 96.”

That got Kayla’s attention.  “It is?”

“Yep.  Which man is it?”

“Excuse me?” Kayla asked with confusion.

“Which man is making you nervous?  Is it Good Nervous here in bed with you, or is it Bad Nervous you’ve been watching like a hawk out there?”

“You see him?”

“Honey, he’s been lurking out there for 20 minutes.”

Steve blinked open his eye; Linda was the first thing he saw.  “Oh, shit, sorry,” he said as he sat up and attempted to leave the bed.

“You lay your head back down, it’s ok, I won’t tell.”

“Yeah?  It’s ok?”

“Not officially … but I’m the nurse assigned, and the doctor doesn’t come in till tomorrow morning for rounds, so you’re probably pretty good medicine,” she said.  Steve gave her a grateful smile and laid his head back down. 

“Thanks, uh …”

“Linda,” she smiled as she retook Kayla’s blood pressure. 

“What is it,” Steve asked when she knitted her brows in concern.”

"Your girl has got herself in a nervous knot,” she said.  “Kayla, you didn’t answer me, but I think I know it anyway.”

“I – it’s ok, Linda, really.” Kayla said as she watched Ed Daniels pace.

“That guy bothering you?” she asked.

“What guy?”  Steve figured she meant Jack, but when he turned his head his heart sank.  “Aw shit.”  Steve went to get up, but Kayla grabbed onto his arm and held him back.  “Please, don’t go out there.”

“Baby, I’ve gotta nip that in the bud, you know this is a bad time for that,” referring to them going on the run.

“Linda, can you find a way to throw him out?  I don’t want him near me.  I also don’t want to see Simon Hopkins.”

“Dr. Hopkins?  Why not, he’s a doll.”

“Linda, I know this is hard to believe, but trust me, he’s not a doll.”

Something about the look on Kayla’s face convinced the older nurse that she meant business.  She wasn’t quite convinced on Dr. Hopkins, but she had no problem getting rid of the suit outside. 

“Don’t you worry your pretty little heads, I’ll get rid of him.”

Steve and Kayla watched as the nurse had what seemed to be a polite but unwavering conversation with Daniels that ended in the man taking a hike. 

“Thank you,” Kayla said when Linda poked her head back in. 

“You’re welcome, honey.  But listen, he said he was FBI. Showed me his badge, looked pretty legit to me.  I’m taking your word for it for now, but might want to give that brother of yours a call, ok, ‘cause no telling with the next shift.”

“Ya done good for us there, Linda,” Steve said, nodding his head up to her.  Kayla thought he sounded so much more like her Steve than the one that rightfully belonged in this body. 

“Don’t thank me, yet.  Kayla if that pressure doesn’t drop with the next vitals check we’re getting Dr. Mike in here.”

Linda finished up with Kayla, made some notes on her chart, and exited to give them their time.

They spent the next while figuring out where to go from here.  There was no question that Steve wasn’t going to be meeting with Daniels or his band of loons, and he wouldn’t be shooting Senator Deveraux, much as now he would have been happy to do so.  The question was whether to bring Roman and the ISA in on the vast wealth of information they had to put the kibosh on the whole thing or not.  After all, there was a contract out on Mike Horton’s life, so sitting on this waiting to jump seemed selfish.  But trying to change it also seemed pointless.  Ultimately, they decided that they’d wait and see how long they were going to be here, and if they were still here when Kayla got released, then they’d go right to Roman.  They both realized that where there was ISA there was Shane, but neither mentioned it.

When Kayla’s dinner arrived, Steve was surprised to see that they gave him one, too.  “Must be my frequent flyer status,” Steve laughed.

“I don’t know, have you earned that yet?”

“Probably not.  That Linda’s a good egg.”

Neither of them had a problem tearing into the less than stellar fare that was University Hospital Food Services, as neither their heads nor bodies had had a meal in quite some time.  Linda was much happier with Kayla’s blood pressure when she came in for the next set of vitals, and they both slept like the dead the rest of the night. 

Kayla limped her way to the bathroom the next morning and hoped they could get out of there as soon as possible. When she got back in bed, she couldn’t help but feel the erection Steve was about to wake up to.  A desire that had nothing to do with lust began in the pit of her stomach and began to spread.  Oh, how she wanted him.  Oh, how she wanted to feel his hands on her, his penis inside her, his body claiming hers.  The hospital smell that’s hard to avoid once you’ve been a guest long enough wasn’t enough to hide the scent of her husband that never changed.  Even that first day when he’d returned in 2006, she could smell that he was him.  She nuzzled her face into Steve’s neck, and he roused.

Sitting up very quickly, he gave her a startled look. Suddenly, Kayla was very wary and rose to a sitting position, as well, a questioning look in her eye.  God, please let him still be here!

Steve grabbed her by the shoulders.  “Do you remember Stockholm?” His voice was gravely from sleep but layered with worry beneath.

Kayla let out her breath in relief.  “What is this, 20 questions,” she said as she embraced him.

“Oh, baby.  I got worried.

“I was ok until you woke up, then I wasn’t sure if maybe you didn’t – I mean that I had the other you … gosh, that does sound weird.”

Steve kissed her and threaded his hands through her hair.   It didn’t take him long to trail his kisses down her neck.  “I need you, Sweetness,” he whispered.  “I’ve been so lonely for you.”

Kayla closed her eyes.  “I’m right here.”

“I need you closer.  I need to be inside you.”

Kayla sighed as he gently sucked on the tender flesh of her shoulder.  She opened her eyes briefly, but that was all it took to bring the reality of their location down upon her.  “We need to get out of here.”

Steve gave her lips one more soft kiss, then he forced himself to get up out of the bed and walk a bit.  When he returned from the bathroom Kayla was up and looking in the small closet by the window. 

“I’m just looking to see if I had any clothes here.  Looks like someone dropped off some stuff for me to wear home.”  She rested her head into her hand, trying to remember the details.  “I just don’t remember who. Had to be mom.”

“I didn’t run into anyone when I came to see you, so I don’t remember, either, sorry, baby.  Steve took her by the shoulders and walked her back over to the bed.  “Come on, back in, baby.” 

“I thought you said your mom and Adrienne were here.”

“This time.  I meant last time.  I didn’t see anyone when I came to see you the first time around.”  He brought the covers back over her and then sank down into the chair next to her.  “

Kayla smirked a little.  “Well that makes sense, ‘cause you didn’t come to see me last time, remember?  We had that argument about it?”

Steve gave her a rueful smile.  “I did, actually.  Right after I met with Daniels and the fake Deveraux.  I came while you were sleeping.  I even kissed you.”

“You did?”

Steve nodded.  “I didn't want you to know I was there.”

Kayla felt a thrill run through her.  “But why?”

“I think I knew you’d talk me out of it.  They got into my head, Sweetness.  They told me you were in danger if we didn’t fake Devreaux’s death so he could undercover.”

“Harper Deveraux?” Kayla said mockingly.  “Undercover?”

“I was stupid.”

“No, you weren’t.”  She hated when he talked badly about himself.

“After the explosion and being worried the whole time you were gonna die … I was just scared something would happen to you if I didn't take that job.”  Kayla took his hand and squeezed it.  “But I did come see you, baby,” he smiled.  “Sat right in this here chair.”

Kayla brought Steve’s hand to her chest and laid it over her heart.  Steve brought the rest of his body along by scooching the chair all the way to the side of the bed.  “I need to be with you,” she whispered.  “After the last few jumps, I need you.”

“I need you, too.  You have no idea how badly I need to make love to you, Kayla.”  He tucked her hair over her ear and leaned over to kiss her cheek.  “Things aren’t right yet.  I need to – feel you around me, baby.”  Steve was entranced by his longing and would have gone on if the tug in his gut hadn’t hit him.  And this one hit him very hard. 

Kayla startled at Steve’s sudden jump in the chair.  “What’s wrong?” she asked with something between denial and dread, as she knew full well exactly what was wrong.

“The pull, baby.  Ungh – dammit!” he was dizzy and sank the side of his head upon her shoulder.  “This one’s so strong.”  Steve’s voice was raspy as he struggled to stay focused.

“Ok,” she said in a slightly panicky tone.  “I’m right behind you, right?  I’ll see you on the other side.”

Steve couldn’t see his surroundings anymore, but he could still feel her hair in his left hand as she held on tight to his other one.  “I love you, Sweetness.”

“I love you, too!”

“Don’t forget we’re ok.”

“Don’t forget how much I love you.”

In the next moment, Steve was struggling to breathe.  For the first time, he didn’t reach up to check for his patch or look at his surroundings, he just tried to breathe.  Was he back in the lab explosion?  Then the pain registered. He was in serious pain.  It wasn’t identifiable; it was just unbelievable pain all over.  That’s when he heard Kayla crying – no, she was practically sobbing.  Baby? 

“I can still give you everything,” she wept. 

“Wha—wh—.”  It was so hard to get a breath.

Kayla laid her head down on his bare chest, laying a kiss upon it, and he could feel how desperate she was.  He’d never seen her like this before, she was talking nonsense.  That’s when he realized that he was now the one laying in the hospital bed, and she was the one in the chair to his right.  The realization of their polar opposite change in orientation confused him.  Did he jump or not?  He must have, where the hell was he?  He couldn’t feel any of the jump effect because everything seemed masked by all the other much worse things his body was currently going through. 

What the hell is happening?   Steve fought to place when he was.  My God, I can’t get a breath.  Steve had a very bad feeling about this as he felt Kayla’s sheer panic, and started to panic more than a little, himself.

“You listen to me,” Kayla desperately said as she took his hand and kissed it.  “We've always gotten our strength from each other. You take what you need. You take what you need from me.”  She was trying so hard to control herself and be strong for him.  But he could feel her abject terror as she stroked his arm and held on to it for dear life while he gasped for breath.  It was in that moment that Steve knew with absolute certainty where he was. 

His deathbed. 

Suddenly everything came into focus. He could see Kayla, the curtain to their right, the planks of the drop ceiling above, and he could hear the machines whirring behind him.  No!  No, this is all wrong! 

Steve had almost no memory of what everyone had assumed were his last moments.  He remembered kissing his daughter, he remembered talking to Jack and Bo and saying goodbye to his mother, and his very last memory was of Kayla being with him.  But his last moments were not in him, and this was … terrifying. 

He knew this was the destination Kayla.  I have to tell her!  It was all happening so fast, he couldn’t process.  He didn’t know which way was up.  A million things went though his mind.  It was only two seconds, maybe three, but that was enough time for his world to bloom in front of him.  His wife, his daughter, his son, his family.  What if we die in these bodies? he remembered wondering when he took care of Kayla after her poisoning.  Maybe I’ll jump.  Then he had to remind himself that he wasn’t going to die in this body, because he never did die.  He was very much alive the whole time.  He had to tell her.  He had to make sure they knew this time that he wasn’t dead.

“Sweet—sweet—,” he gasped, trying to get her attention.  She rose her head while still clutching his forearm, and when he looked into her eyes, he couldn’t believe how scared she was.  He’d never seen anything like this in her eyes, not even at their very worst moments.  He couldn’t take what he saw there.  He couldn’t take how haunted she already was.  He dug deep within him to try to tell her.  He tried so hard to explain to her that he wasn’t going to die and not to let them take his body away, that he was alive and wasn’t leaving her this time … but he felt the blackness overtaking him.  Besides, he could not deny … he was as terrified as she was.

He couldn’t breathe, he was positively drowning as his lungs screamed at him to fill them.  Finally, after only mere seconds that felt far longer than they actually were, he did the only thing his quickly fading consciousness would allow him.  And that was say goodbye.  Kayla looked at him with meager hope as he used every last ounce of strength to utter his next words to her. 

“… Sweetness ...” he locked eyes with her.  “I lo … I love you … Sweetness.”

Steve gasped and whimpered as the tears poured down his wife’s terrified face. 

“I love you too,” she sobbed as she stroked his face.  “I love you, too.  Shh.” 

Kayla kissed his hand, then the machine alarmed a flatline, and his world went black.

Only …

… It was a very strange sort of black.  He wasn’t conscious.  But he wasn’t quite unconscious, either.  It was a almost like a thick haze.  He wasn’t at all aware of himself or his surroundings, but there was a dreamy quality to his cognition.  He heard voices as a thick jumble of sound, no specific words, and only a few people he could identify.

“Come on Mr. Johnson!  Mr. Johnson!”  That he heard.  Suddenly an image of the boat he was on with the drugged sandwich and his guard, Tiny, came to him.  It was the same doctor. 

Then a smaller voice rose to the surface of his mind, and he reached out for it.  “Dear god!” his wife sobbed.  “Don’t take him, please.  Don’t take him.”  It was the worst thing he’d ever heard in his life, and if he was awake, he’d have been sobbing with her just at the sound of it.

The next thing he felt was the sudden pain of a defibrillator delivering the electric shock that was to start his heart. Only his heart hadn’t actually stopped beating.  The pain was searing, and it electrified his haze with veins of lightning.  God, make it stop!

He heard Jack’s voice, then Kayla again.  “If they'd let me talk to him, if they'd just let me talk to him, he'd live, I know … he’d be ok!” she continued to sob.

Then another shock of the defibrillator.  I’m not dead, goddammit! 

“I don't understand what happened,” he heard Kayla say. He reached out for her across the haze.  His mind was screaming out to her, trying to make her feel him.  Baby, I’m here, please hear me!  “You know, he was talking, he was awake, everything was ok, I don't know what happened!”  She was positively hysterical. 

Another searing charge ripped through Steve’s body, and he was helpless to do anything about it.  With every shock came more awareness of himself.  He didn’t understand it, he didn’t even try to, all he could do was lay there and wait for it to be over. 

“Kayla please,” he heard Jack say.

Then Marcus’s voice was above him.  “Leave, Kayla, now, go!  Go!”

No, baby, don’t go!

Now Steve was very alert.  The rest of the life-saving measures that occurred in that room on October 23^rd of 1990 Steve heard with glaring clarity.  The haze was still there, and it was still murky, but his sense of touch and sound were crisp as morning dew. 

“Atropine,” Marcus commanded.

“We did,” Dr. Hopkins replied.  Of course, this was a different Dr. Hopkins.  It seemed all the bad ones were named Hopkins.

“Well, do it again!” Marcus snapped.

“We tried it!”

“Come on, man,” Marcus begged.

“Clear!” someone rang out.  God, not again.

“Come on Steve, come on man,”

Lightning illuminated more of his haze as the shock burned from his chest down through his toes and fingertips. 

“Come on, hey come on homeboy, come on back to me, now, come on now, you can do it, come on …”  Homey, I’m right here, man.  “Come on!”

“It's been five minutes.”

“Five minutes,” Marcus repeated with dread, denial spreading through him.  “Come on, come on.”

“Charging.”  Shit.

Another shock, and his body shook on the bed.

“Nothing.  Still nothing.”

“Alright, defibrillate,” Marcus said as he started to lose it.  There was a brief silence, and Steve expected they were about to give up, but Marcus erupted.  “COME ON!  YOU'RE READY COME ON, DAMMIT!  I SAID DO IT!  DO IT NOW, DO IT!”

“It’s over,” Dr. Hopkins insisted.

“No!” Marcus was now crying.  “NO!”

“It’s no use,” the doctor on Alamain’s payroll said.

“No, no, no!”  Then Marcus pounded on Steve’s chest with his fist, which felt infinitely better than the crash cart.  “Come on!” Marcus begged as he began manual compressions. 

“He’s gone!” the older man pleaded. 

Steve’s heart broke as Marcus laid himself upon Steve’s chest.  “Come on Steve, one little heartbeat, please, come on man, come on back to me man, come on now.”  He hadn’t heard Marcus cry like that since they were kids in the orphanage, and it about killed him.  “Come on, you can do it. Come on, man, don't you leave me like this, come on Steve, please! Please!”

“Marcus—“

“Please.”

“I'm sorry doctor.”

“Please,” Marcus cried.  “Damn you, Steve.  Why?” 

Yeah, damn me!  Hell yes, damn ME!  Why can’t I just open my eyes!  He struggled and tried with all that he had to move, but it was as if he were paralyzed.  Wait … I am paralyzed.  Steve was suddenly very aware of just how this all went down.  And he was pissed.  The whole thing was going to shit.  Not only did he know he wasn’t going to die and couldn’t get the words out, but now he had to sit here and listen to the people he loved deal with it while he laid there helpless.

“I guess I'd better go out and tell his wife,” Dr. Hopkins said with false regret.

“No,” Marcus said.  “Me.  I’m gonna tell her.”

“You sure?”

“I'll tell her!”

Steve’s mind was racing.  He fought to be rational.  He had to do what he could to block out everything around him, his best friend, the doctors, the nurses, the machines humming around him, even his wife. He had to focus on what was going to come next.  But it was hard to overcome the strangled cries from Kayla on the other side of the curtain.  They were just snippets of the conversation, but what he did hear threatened to shatter him.

“He’s gonna snap right out of it … Give me a chance to prove it … NO, BO!”  And the sobs.  He heard her pained sobs, and the thought of just withdrawing inside himself and letting himself be dead sounded so good to him.  Like such relief from the pain.  He thought about it for a few moments.  He really did.  But somewhere on the cusp of his anguish was the fact that he was not dead.  This was not death.  This was nothing more than a ruse.  A lie.  Perpetrated by the very doctor that was still in the silent room with him right now for all he knew.  He tried to call up a memory of what happened to him next, but he couldn’t.  So, he knew he had to think this through, and if he was going to find her, then he had to get this right. 

Let her find you.

The thought came to him, and he realized with relief that his Kayla wasn’t there yet, but when she got there she’d come for him.  His relief was misplaced, however, because he realized with dread that she had no idea where to look.  And neither did he.  Did he?

You weren’t even out of that hospital basement yet, he remembered Tiny say.  They had you gagged and tied down to the gurney by the time they assigned me to you.  Tiny was the second guy.  First there was gonna be some guy whose teeth he was going to kick in.  That was gonna feel good, he thought with anticipation.

No, if he was going to get out of this, he was going to have to do it himself, because Kayla had no idea where to look.  Why didn’t he tell her what Tiny had said on the boat?  He made a mental note to tell Kayla everything about what he knew about his disappearance.  He just hoped he’d remember it.  In fact, it would be best if he just jumped right now, and he waited a few moments, hoping he could will it to happen.  But it didn’t.

His racing thoughts were interrupted by the, frankly, creepy feel of Dr. Hopkins pulling the sheet over his head when he heard him say, “Mrs. Johnson.”  Baby?  You here, Sweetness?  He couldn’t see her.  Where was she?!

When he felt her touch his hand, he felt the thrill course through him.  How could she not feel it?

“You're so warm.  You're so warm.”  Kayla’s voice was so soft he could barely hear her.  She kissed his hand, and he cried to himself as he felt her grief.  “You're so warm,” she kept repeating as she put his hand to her and caressed it against her neck and chest.  “You're so warm.”

When he felt Kayla crawl into the bed with him, he couldn’t take it.  Baby, please.  I’m here with you.  I haven’t left you.  Oh, God, Kayla, please!  Please! 

Kayla rained so many kisses upon his hand, he couldn’t count them.  She comforted him and nurtured him into his death so that he wouldn’t be alone.  She laid her head against him and rained down a torrent of silent tears.

“I just want to hold you.  Feel you close to me.”  She kissed him and sniffed in his scent as she nuzzled against him.  “You are my best friend,” she whispered.  Steve was overwhelmed.  He didn’t have words for how he was feeling other than pure and utter devastation.  She kissed his neck.  “I love you.”  Then she exhaled deeply so that she could take in more of his scent and imprint it within herself.  “You know, I'm gonna be strong.  For you.  For our baby girl.  For everybody.”  Only now Steve knew.  He knew just how hard it was really going to be, and just how much she was going to struggle to be as strong as she said.  She couldn’t stop snuggling her face against the crook of his neck.  She couldn’t stop, and he didn’t want her to.  He needed to feel her against him, because he had never been so scared.  “I promise you that,” she said.  “I promise you that.”  She continued to nuzzle him and showered kisses upon his neck, all while continually stroking his hand with her thumb.  A comforting act, as if she thought he could feel her there.  An act that said I’m here, you’re safe, it’s ok.

Kayla laid there a long time, and Steve just took in the inordinate amount of love she was silently giving him.  Her tears fell in rivers.  He absorbed them into his skin and tried to hold onto them like footholds on a precipice.  I’m sorry, baby, I didn’t know.  He wanted to embrace her and hold her and tell her that it would be ok.  But he couldn’t move.  He felt himself trying with all his might to move, to shift just a finger, an eyelid.  He bore down with the force of what he felt must be a thousand suns, but nothing twitched.  He could actually feel the vein in his neck pulse against him, and he recalled Kayla saying that she thought she’d seen that but knew it couldn’t be true.  Only it was true.  But the signals to move weren’t making it from his brain to a single other part of his body to just move the muscles.  He never gave up.  Not even as he cried silently to himself as he felt his wife hold him.  Not even when he heard Marcus’s voice invade the wretched silence of their final union

“Kayla.  It's time to go.”

Not yet!

“I'm not ready.”  It was so soft he barely heard it.

“Kayla, people are out there to see you.  They have to take Steve away.”

“I can't leave him.”  She continued to stroke his hand with her thumb.  She hadn’t stopped from the moment she’d crawled into the bed with him.

“Come on.  It's gonna be ok.  Come on, I'll take you.”

Steve felt her move away from him with the same pain he felt when the social worker at the orphanage ripped him apart from his mother.  He was barely hanging on to his sanity.

Kayla kissed his chest and let Marcus gently lift her away from him.  “I love you,” she said as she kissed his cheek and the last of her tears fell upon his cheek with burning hot clarity.  Then she finally left his side. 

The last thing he heard was the sound of the curtain being dragged closed against the people he loved and cared about.  He was stuck here now.  In a body that wasn’t dead.  With no one that knew he was still in there.  Alone.

Chapter Text

Find Me
Chapter 55

The sea of emotions running through Steve threatened to drive him straight over the edge.  As he lay on the hospital bed waiting for whatever was coming next, he waged an internal war with himself trying to keep himself from succumbing to the insanity that was trying to drown him.  It felt like his world was coming apart, and it was three strong emotions that were doing the most damage.  The anger was easiest, he knew what to do with that.  He knew how to channel that fury into motivation.  That was an emotion he’d met so many times in his life that it was like an old friend.  And thank God, because he needed something familiar right now. 

Unfortunately, he also had helplessness to deal with.  That was something Steve didn’t have a lot of experience with, and that cancelled out the motivation the anger gave him.  He tried to stay angry, but the fact that he had no control over his situation at all weakened his resolve.  He had no choice but to lie there trapped and immobilized, and there wasn’t a damn thing he could do about it.  

Nothing was worse, however, than the fear.  It’s not that being afraid was completely unknown to him, he simply didn’t have any ability to process it thanks to the utter immobility.  Fight or flight took hold of him, only he couldn’t act on either one.  He couldn’t lift a finger to fight, and he certainly couldn’t move a muscle to flee.  It was a nightmare.  The very worst kind of nightmare he could have ever imagined. 

I’m not ready.  I can’t leave him. 

The sound of his wife’s defeated voice haunted him.  When she was holding him, he felt some measure of security, but when Marcus tore her away, the vulnerability crept over him like a cold shroud.  He didn’t know how long he’d been left in that room alone, he’d lost track of time, it could have been five minutes, it could have been an hour.  How long did dead bodies wait for loved ones to leave before they were taken to the slabs in the basement?  He had no idea.  But fear had gripped him for however long that was.  He remembered the condition he was in when he jumped off Alamain’s boat and feared what lay in wait for him.  Live captors were bad enough, but the concept of sharing any space with any guests that really were dead – or worse, being mistaken for dead – was unfathomable.  And he was really scared of spending any time in a coffin.  It was abject fear, and he prayed to either jump or pass out just so he could escape it.  No wonder people going through horrific experiences tended to block them out of their memories.  If there was an experience that could do that to you, this was it.

And it was with that thought that Steve started thinking things through.  He had no memory of any of this.  Not an image.  Not a snatch of a whisp of a recollection.  It was brand new to him. 

Or was it?

This was Steve’s second time through these events, that was a fact.  Somewhere in the back of his mind he had assumed that he was conscious during this go-round, meaning for the first time, because he was jumping.  But that didn’t actually make any sense.  When Kayla was suffering from the poisoning, she wasn’t aware of herself.  When she was unconscious the other day in Mike’s lab, she wasn’t able to hear what was happening and talk about it later.  When she jumped into a drunk body she couldn’t be sober, because her body wasn’t sober.  So, it wouldn’t make any sense that his unconscious body could hear and feel everything that had happened to him just now if he were really unconscious the first time.  No, he had experienced them because he’d experienced them the first time, too.  So, why couldn’t he remember them?

Because you blocked them out, dude.  Your mind is protecting you.  You don’t remember, because it won’t let you remember.

And for the first time since he’d arrived here, he was thinking rationally.  He started piecing together just how this all went down and very slowly started to calm down.  He was still angry, and he still felt helpless, and he was still scared; but he felt a small win for his epiphany, and it gave him some strength.

Why can’t I move?

Steve didn’t know that Dr. Hopkins had replaced his IV bag with a paralytic agent.  He had no idea that the man had altered the machines to recognize his vastly slowed heart rate as a flatline.  He couldn’t know that the doctor had to keep up appearances by shocking him with the crash cart paddles with the full knowledge that Steve’s heart had never stopped beating.  But he did know that this was a bad doctor. 

There must be a drug in my body, he thought. 

That was confirmed when two things happened at the same time.  The first was when he felt himself move his thumb; it was ever so slight, but it was there.  The drug was very short term, and it was wearing off.  The second was when he felt the poke of a hypodermic needle sink into the carotid artery in his neck.  He assumed Hopkins had seen the movement in this thumb and topped him off, but that wasn’t the case.  This was a super-concentrated dose of an experimental beta-blocker that had been re-designed as a memory-altering drug.  Steve waited for the feeling in his thumb to disappear again but was taken by surprise when movement continued to return to him one finger at a time.

“Time to take a little trip, Mr. Johnson,” Dr. Hopkins whispered into the empty room.  “So sorry about your untimely death.  Don’t worry, you won’t remember it five minutes from now.  You won’t even remember your own name.”

This was it.  They were finally moving him to the basement.  Where was Kayla?  Steve hadn’t heard his wife’s voice in quite some time.  Where was she?  Did she go?  Run away?  He reached out across the darkness for her.  He tried to picture where she was.  He almost felt like he’d found her when he heard someone pull the curtain aside and then felt himself being wheeled out of the room and down the hall.   You won’t even remember your own name.  That wasn’t true.  Tiny had told him that he never stopped calling for Kayla; so, he knew his memory was intact in the time immediately following his faked death.  Steve opened his eye to a slit and saw the ceiling roll past him.  Relief flooded through him like a drowning man getting his first gulp of air.  He could move.  He could feel that he was able to move all of his fingers and toes, now, and he was shocked at the speed with which that ability was returning.  It couldn’t have been more than one hour’s time, could it?  That paralytic drug was very effective but not very lasting.  Even so, he still couldn’t make his head turn or his eye open all the way.  You don’t wanna do that, dude.  Keep it closed.  Make ‘em think you’re still out.   

Steve now had a better handle on his emotions.  They were still there, but he was able to rationalize through them much better.  It was a struggle, but he used the information he had now that he didn’t have before to try to formulate a plan.  He ticked through what he knew:  He was being moved to the hospital basement.  The drug was wearing off.  He was given something different to make him forget.  He was going to be tied down and gagged.  The drug was already wearing off, so maybe the first time through he fought through it, and that was why they tied him down.  He had no idea, really, but he felt the safest thing to do would be to play dead.

And that’s what he did.  He didn’t try to move a single muscle, but he could feel his toes start to tingle with somewhat painful pins and needles.  He realized too late that he should have been memorizing the turns and straightaways he was feeling as they rolled his gurney through the bowels of the hospital.

Finally, Dr. Hopkins parked Steve exactly where he was afraid he’d end up, the morgue.  No bodies or personnel were in the room at the time, but there was no mistaking the antiseptic smell.  He didn’t dare open his eye to look, but he imagined the deep-welled, steel tables and body drawers that lined the wall.  The whole place felt cold and empty … dead.

“I know you’re in there, even if you can’t hear me yet,” Dr. Hopkins said into Steve’s ear.  “You’ve been such a good little boy, dying right on time, failing to resuscitate, staying dead.”  Then without warning, he ripped off the bandage covering Steve’s left eye and let out an annoyed breath.  “Damn.”  Just then another man entered the room.  “Where’s the wife?” Hopkins spat.

“Huh?” the new guy asked.

“The wife, where is she?”

“How do I know?”

“We need his belongings.  His eyepatch, his wallet, his jacket, we’re going to need all of those things. Did she take them?”

“Again, I don’t know anything about where the wifey went.  But I can tell ya that you’re not getting any of the guy’s stuff, ‘cause Dr. Curtis beat you to it.  Already cleared out the guy’s room.”

“Alright, look, you stay with him, he’s going to be confused when he wakes up, not know who he is.  Once he’s awake, if anyone sees him, we’re out of business.  So, whatever you do, don’t let him out of your sight.”

“Where are you going?”

“I need to find him something to wear and an eyepatch.  I’ll be back in an hour.”  Then Dr. Hopkins turned and left. 

Steve didn’t know what to do.  It appeared there was just this one guy, and he assumed that it was the guy that ended up getting the short end of the stick last time.  He could feel his strength returning, only he’d just woken up from a coma earlier that day, so his body wasn’t exactly ready to fight.  If he tried to make a run for it, how would things be any different than last time.  Maybe the timing?  Maybe he’d started fighting much earlier last time, before Hopkins had left them.  He also realized that even though far more than five minutes had gone by, his memory was completely intact.

Suddenly, Steve felt this guy start pulling on his toe.  “You awake?” he asked.  Steve didn’t move.  Then he pulled harder.  “You in there or you in dreamland?”  The guard wasn’t getting any reaction out of Steve.  “Look, I ain’t stayin’ in a morgue by myself for an hour, Hopkins,” he said to no one in particular.  Then he leaned down and inspected Steve’s face, running a finger across what was left of Steve’s left eyebrow.  That almost made Steve show his hand.  Not reacting to this guy touching his eye almost did him in, but he stayed strong, knowing it was very likely going to be the difference between getting out of there or repeating history.  “Sickening.  That’s just gross.”  Steve really wanted to kick in his teeth like last time.  Hell, for all he knew, maybe that’s why he did.  “Yeah, he ain’t in there,” the guard said aloud, then exited the room to stand outside of it and guard from there. 

What time is it?  Where’s the attendant?  Steve couldn’t understand how they could get away with just leaving him in here like this.  Didn’t people work here?

As soon as he heard the heavy doors swing shut with the automatic door mechanism, Steve opened his eye and flexed his fingers.  Not only were those muscles all completely back, but his adrenaline was building, so he felt like he could very likely stand.  Walking was another matter, but one thing at a time.

Steve raised his arms up so that he could see his hands and watched himself flex them.  He felt his face and was less than thrilled to feel what he knew to be true, his face was bare.  He didn’t have time to be horrified or self-conscious or, frankly, care, he just had to get out.  He rolled over onto his left side with far more effort than he thought it would take and pushed himself up into a sitting position, letting his legs swing down.  He hopped off the gurney and was grateful when he didn’t collapse in a heap.  He was standing up on his own two legs, and he felt pretty steady.  It was not, however, easy; the drug was dissipating at a rapid rate, but it wasn’t completely gone, and his injuries from the explosion were still quite a factor. 

Steve spent the next ten minutes getting his bearings while nervously glancing out the tiny window to check on the guard.  He walked the room, and with every moment that passed he got stronger and stronger.  His memory didn’t seem affected to him in the least, as he mapped out in his head exactly what he needed to do.  He had to get out of there.  His fight or flight hadn’t diminished, and it was fueling his ability to overcome the pain and weakness from his injuries.  He thought his best chance was to slip away under the guard’s nose, but he knew it might come to a battle, and if it did, he was prepared to win.  He was prepared to do whatever it took to escape the 16 years of capture and separation from his wife and family.  If that meant killing the man, then that’s what he was going to do.  His knowledge of the future gave him this opportunity.  He had one shot, and he knew it.

Steve’s biggest problem was his state of undress.  He had on a simple pair of hospital-issue bottoms that were no more than glorified pajamas.  He was moving well, now, and quickly scanned the area for scrubs.  Luckily, he found some in a locker in the adjoining room.  They were too small, but he made do.  The bare feet he wasn’t going to be able to help at the moment.  Being so close to escaping galvanized him so much that he didn’t even give a second thought to his exposed eye. 

Steve carefully approached the door.  The guard was sitting in a chair near the doors blending in with his surroundings.  The hallway was empty other than that, which was not surprising given its location in the bowels of the hospital.  There was no way he was going to slip by him unnoticed.  So, he thought fast and grabbed a long, metal instrument from the counter.  He didn’t want to know what it was used for, but it was very solid.  Time was ticking away, and he felt his future slipping away, so he didn’t have time to think this out, he just acted.  When he opened the door and angled only the right side of his face to him, the guard stood up fast. 

“Hopkins said to watch him you idiot!”

“Huh?!”

“Guy pulled a disappearing act on you?  Nice job.”

“He’s gone?!”

Steve prayed the guard stayed as stupid as he seemed and stepped aside for the man to check himself.  The guard ran in, and let an expletive fly.  When he turned back around he didn’t know what hit him.  Steve had whipped the steel tool across his jaw so hard that the man went down in a heap.

“You’re lucky it’s not your teeth this time, asshole.”

Wasting no time, Steve ran from the morgue as fast as his weakened state would take him.  Something told him not to take the elevator, so he ascended the stairs the two flights it took to reach the ground level and ran out into the parking garage.  He was completely winded, but his adrenaline running at such a high level did its job to keep him going.  He would have made it out into the night without another issue if it weren’t for Hopkins nearly bowling him over as they each rounded the same corner into each other. 

“Pardon me,” the doctor said as Steve covered his eye with his hand.  Then they each did a double take and stared in shock for a moment.  Hopkins moved first.  Rearing back to punch Steve in the face, the younger man easily saw it coming and evaded contact, but he was too slow to avoid the doctor’s momentum from the miss.  Hopkins fell into Steve, and they both fell against the wall.  Steve immediately pushed him off and felt the energy in him threaten to explode through the top of his head.  He’d dropped his hand by now and was in an all out fight for his life.  Right here, right now, this was it.  The last challenge to his freedom.  Realizing he still had the instrument in his right hand, Steve repeated what he’d done to the guard in the morgue and let it fly across the doctor’s face.  He connected on the first try, and the wail that came out of the man was ear-splitting.  And it should have been, because Steve had opened up a gash that went from his carotid artery up his cheek at a steep angle and ripped open the man’s right eyelid.  It was grotesque to say the least as the man’s eye appeared to protrude from the shredded eyelid.  It was a poetic justice that Steve didn’t have time to ponder .  He took just one moment to look at the doctor apply pressure to his badly bleeding neck and knew the man was not going to make it to the ER before he bled out.

“You … you animal,” Hopkins gasped.  Steve didn’t say anything.  The doctor who had taken Steve from his family all those years ago, who’d enabled the whole thing to happen, started to shake uncontrollably as he very quickly went into shock.  “Help me!  I’m going to bleed to death!”

“Yeah you are,” Steve replied with venom.  “Help you?  Like you helped me?  Right into 16 years of hell you helped me.  Well, I’m not your good little boy, you piece of shit.  So, you’ll excuse me if I decide to return the favor.”

“You … you …”

“I had to find my own way out of death.  You’re gonna have to do the same.”

Without another word, without another glance in the doctor’s direction as he bled out on the cleanly kept concrete of the parking garage floor, Steve ran for his life.

Chapter Text

Find Me
Chapter 56

Rolf took off his glasses and rubbed at his eyes with the knuckle of his hand. 

No matter how many times he read the reports, and no matter how he tried to find an explanation, he wasn’t going to find anything there other than pure fact.  And that fact was that their trajectory was no longer in shared time.   He’d actually already resigned himself to that; one random jump out of shared time wasn’t that monumental.  It wasn’t planned and shouldn’t happen, true, but one or two of them could easily be attributed to the pure variability of time.  No, the real shocker was that their jumps were on an actual arc.  A very real and very specific arc.  The numbers on this drew a line though the slipstream that was undeniable.  He didn’t know why – he certainly didn’t send them on it – but there it was.  An arc that he could only qualify as the effect of an unanticipated cause:  Them.  Unless time had a mind of its own, that was the only explanation available to him.  All Rolf could figure was that they sent themselves down this path all on their own with a change they’d made.  Of course, that was just speculation.  It’s not like he could see what they saw like some closed circuit television.  He didn’t know exactly what they were doing, all he knew was when they were.  But there was no doubt that they were forging new time, their jumps were on an arc that he had no hand in creating, and the events of that arc were related. 

Rolf had to get control of the timeline.  It was like lanes on a track; they started out on one lane, but they’d somehow jumped lanes.  Only that wasn’t even accurate, it was more like a windy road through a forest no one had ever been to the end of, and now they weren’t on the path anymore, they’d jumped across a stream. 

It was risky, but if he didn’t try to open a new window for them so the slipstream could deposit them into the right lane of travel, he might never be able to stop the jumps from occurring. 

This was not what he’d had planned.  It ruined everything.  So, he set to work on putting everything in place to get them back to his original plan.

Chapter Text

Find Me
Chapter 57

Steve had no idea where he was supposed to go.  His instinct was to go home – to run home as fast as his feet could take him.  Unfortunately, home was too far to go to on foot, and he wasn’t exactly feeling well.  His ribs were aching, and his head was starting to feel fuzzy. 

I just left a man to die.  He is going to die, and I killed him.  “That’s two,” Steve whispered aloud, then shook it away.

He had run out of the parking structure and into the night where the last of the sun’s rays had just dipped below the milky October horizon, and the pinpricks of stars were struggling to be seen in the darkened sky.  He was winded and leaned over, resting his elbows upon his thighs as he struggled to catch his breath.  This wasn’t going to work.  He had to call someone to get him.  And just what are you gonna say, dude, hey, it’s me, Steve, I’m not really dead, can I have a ride home?   No, that wasn’t going to do anything but put the person on the other end into shock.  He couldn’t take a cab, because he had no money.  So, his best choice was to fall back on skills that came second nature to him and hotwire a car.  He’d drive himself home, that was the only way.  So, he walked back into the parking garage and started trying doors.  It didn’t take long to find a late ‘80’s model Oldsmobile that opened for him.

That’s when he saw it.  The Bluesmobile.  Sitting in the parking lot right where Kayla must have parked it.  He could see Stephanie’s car seat strapped into it through the back window.  He was some distance away, but that black car, old even then, was right there.  The memory of it washed over him with such ferocity it nearly bowled him over.  The desire to just get in his own car – the same car that now sat in front of his apartment in 2009 – was strong.  He leaned against the blue car he’d had the intention of hotwiring and took a deep breath.  And before he could really get his wits about him to decide one way or the other, his decision was made for him when he saw Kayla. 

“Baby?”

His wife was approaching their car.  And she was a mess.  Her eyes were so puffy that he could see them from even this distance.  Her ponytail was hanging at a sideways angle, the strands had come out of their elastic, and her face was nothing short of ashen.  This wasn’t his Kayla, she was still the one of this destination.  How long had it been since she left his deathbed?  He’d lost all track of time, and for all he knew it had only been an hour and not the several it felt like.  She must have been just now leaving the hospital to go home.

She doesn’t go home.

“That’s right, you didn’t go home, Sweetness,” Steve whispered to himself.  He wanted to go to her so badly.  There was nothing he needed more right now than to hold her.  But he held back.  Because this was 1990 Kayla.  This was the Kayla that had just watched her husband die in her arms.  This was the woman that held him for God-knows how long, unable to tear herself away.  If he came at her out from the shadows he didn’t know how she’d react. 

He balanced on the cusp of going to her and staying hidden, unsure which path he’d follow.  He watched her put her key into the door and unlock it as if she were on automatic.  She opened the door and stood there in complete stillness for a moment.  She’d closed her eyes as she gripped the roof of the car.  My God, she was so lost.  He could see that she was just adrift in grief.  He knew he could go to her and show her he was ok, but something stopped him.  The knowledge that she wasn’t his Kayla yet gave him pause, and by the time he’d decided that he didn’t care and that he had to go to her, it was too late.  He’d waited too long, and before he knew it she’d gotten in the car, started it, and had begun pulling out of the garage.  Where did you go?  The only thing he could do was follow her.

Steve slipped into the Olds and yanked down the wiring.  Some things just don’t go away, and he could have hotwired this car in his sleep.  Which is practically what he’d done, his head was in such a daze.  He felt the smoothly grooved surface of the pedals beneath his bare feet and saw the taillights of the Bluesmobile a block ahead of him.  He didn’t care where she was going, he’d be following behind her, waiting for his Kayla to arrive.  His head started feeling fuzzy, though, and he wondered if the drug Hopkins had injected him with was doing something to him after all.  He went to adjust his patch and cursed when it wasn’t there.

When Kayla unexpectedly turned left onto Water Street instead of going straight ahead toward their house, he knew exactly where she was going and smiled.  She was going to the one place that she might be able to feel him most.  The first place their souls had met and mated for life.  The roof of the loft.

Kayla parked the car up against the wall and didn’t blink at the fact that she was straddling the line.  Steve pulled into the parking lot very slowly and watched as she disappeared into the building.  Their loft belonged to Jennifer now, but she still had a key.  Steve didn’t waste any time, he wanted to be on that roof when she got there.  He started up the far fire escape, rather than the one he’d scaled so many times in the past, because its ladder was far closer to the ground.  As a result, he reached the roof with less difficulty than he rightfully should have.  That’s how much adrenaline was pumping through his body.

He didn’t wait long for Kayla to appear on the roof.  He was hidden from view behind a vent, so she didn’t see him.  Wait for her.  Wait for yours to get there.  He knew that was the right decision, but he wasn’t really sure why.  So, he just watched her lean up against the brick wall as she dared to look at the locket she had clutched in her hand.  The look on her face was killing him.  Right be damned, Kayla was Kayla, she was hurting, so was he, and he had to go to her.  He didn’t care what was right and what was wrong anymore, he only cared that his wife was standing there on the roof that would always be theirs, thinking that he was dead.  He took a step toward her but stopped abruptly when Kayla leaned the back of her head against the brick wall and started sobbing like he’d never heard her sob before.  Unlike the cries he heard at the hospital, these were horrendous, wailing sobs.  He’d never seen her cry this before in his life, and never ever wanted to see it again. 

Steve stood in stunned shock as Kayla’s cries overtook her at her core.  She slid down against the wall and fell to the ground in a heap, the strangled, guttural emotion pouring out of her was so raw that he felt it from all the way across the roof.  She called his name in pained sobs that made him sob, too.  He was positively taken aback. 

“Steeeeeve!” Kayla cried into the wind.  “I don’t want to do this without you!  Please, Steve …”  Kayla hiccupped and cried and wept so hard she had to hold her stomach from the strain.  “I’m not going on.  I’m not!  I-I-I-I-I …” She couldn’t get a breath as she began to hyperventilate.  “I love you …”

My God, I didn’t know, Sweetness.  I didn’t know how bad it was!  God, I can’t stand it!  He held his hands over his ears and sank to his knees from behind the vent.  Make it stop!  Please make it stop!

Steve had always known that Kayla grieved, and he learned more about that pain and what it did to her on these recent, terrible jumps that had practically split them open.  But it was nothing compared to living it – seeing it happen right in front of him.  Only now, as he watched his wife ‘s choked cries wrack her body – only now as he saw her on the ground with her hands in her hair and tears streaming down her face – did he truly understand the depth of her sorrow.  The severity of her grief.  The way her life would change forever was now manifested in front of him.  Shane, single motherhood, living in Los Angeles, becoming a doctor, loneliness; those things were now in her future.  Sailing around the world, filling their lives with more children, growing 16 years older with her soul mate; those things weren’t.  The way she’d begged and pleaded and cried when he left her the night he’d tried to choke her in his sleep were the worst sounds he’d ever heard from her; but these were much worse.

“Why did you have to take him from meeeeeeeeeeee,” she screamed, “… and fro-fro-from Ste-Stephanie?!”

Steve couldn’t take it.  He had to end this.  He was afraid of what the shock of seeing him would do to her while she was in this state, but he was more afraid of what not going to her would do to him.  He wiped his eyes and faintly registered that his bare feet were freezing as he was finally able to force his body to take a step from behind the vent. 

But then Kayla’s cries ebbed quickly.  Her breathing slowed, and she wiped a hand for the thousandth time across her cheeks as she took deep, controlling breaths.  Her eyes were bloodshot and swollen as she stood up and leaned against the same brick wall.  Then she walked over to the skylight right beside where they’d made love for the first time; where he’d collapsed to his knees on their first jump realizing that their son wasn’t there.  More tears leaked from his eye as he allowed himself to feel sorry as much for himself as he did for her.  She looked at the locket again, and Steve called to her.

“Sweetness?” he cried.

Kayla’s head shot up, and for a a few very brief seconds, her eyes registered incredulity, shock, and hope.  Then her lids fell to half, and she froze at the very moment that he reached her.

“Don’t be scared, baby, it’s me,” he cried as his arms encircled her.  “Come here, and let me hold you!”  As he tipped her chin up toward him, he felt how stiff she was and feared she was in the exact shock he’d wanted to avoid.  I did the wrong thing.  “Sweetness?”   But as he’d shifted her with his embrace she became dead weight.  The locket fell to the ground with a ping against the slate roof, and he saw her eyes were completely blank.  Devoid of any kind of awareness at all. 

It wasn’t shock, it was a jump.  His Kayla was jumping in.  Finally!  He was overwhelmed with relief, but he also felt more than a little sorrow for not being able to connect with the destination Kayla.  The one he left all those years ago with a gaping emotional wound to live through and manage without him.  The one who had just been weeping uncontrollably who he hadn’t made it to in time.  He wanted to comfort her and make her pain go away.  But the regret was fleeting, because she was now showing every sign that his Kayla was on her way. 

“Kayla!  Thank God, baby, come on!  Come to me.  Where are ya, now, come on!

It seemed to take forever, but in reality it took the same amount of time it always took once their destination bodies went blank.  Steve held the back of Kayla’s head in his right hand as his left arm held her up.  But his injuries were getting the best of him, and if she didn’t get there soon, he was going to have to find someone to hold him up.  He kissed her cheeks and lips and forehead gently coaxing her 2009 consciousness to the surface.  Finally, she took a gulp of air.

Kayla blinked in her very silent and very warm hospital bed in 1987, then opened her eyes to her husband calling her name over and over again.  She felt his kisses and knew this was her Steve.  Not just because he’d jumped first, but because she just knew.  Even so, he didn’t feel right to her in the suddenly cold air.

“Steve!”

“Right here!  It’s me, baby, it’s me!”  He rained kisses upon her face, he was so happy to see her.  “Are you you, baby?  Please be you.  Please, I need you so much.”

“Yes, it’s me,” she said between his kisses, immediately wary as she looked at Steve’s bare face.  He wasn’t wearing his patch, but he didn’t have two eyes, either.  Nothing was less in his nature than being in public without his patch.  Plus, Steve was shaking.  She could feel him trembling as he held on to her.  She palmed his face with her right hand and felt his freezing cold skin as she took in his appearance.  No patch.  Scrubs.  Why?  “What’s wrong?” she asked with unmistakable edge to her voice.  “Something is very wrong, here, Steve, where are we?  You’re not wearing your patch.”  She ran her thumb gently along the very bottom edge of where his eye used to be.  “How long have you been here without me?”

Steve took a deep breath and closed his eye to the relief of having her with him.  “You got here.  Thank God you got here.”  He engulfed her with his embrace and wobbled them both unsteadily as his strength drained out of him. 

“Easy, easy,” Kayla said.

Steve let himself sink down to one knee and put his face in his hand as it rested on his elbow. 

Kayla got down with him.  “We’re … we’re on the roof?  You’re not wearing any shoes!  Are we running?  When is this?  Steve, please talk to me!”

Steve picked up the locket that had fallen from her destination version’s hands.  “Look familiar?”

Kayla examined the locket she knew oh so well, even if she hadn’t seen it lately.  “Of course, it’s my locket.  I haven’t worn it in a while, but I used to wear it a lot when …” Then it hit her.  “Oh my God,” she whispered as she reached her hand into her hair and then held her arm in front of her to examine her clothes.  Her heart skipped a beat.  “When is this?” her voice shook.

“I just escaped from the morgue.  I just watched you watch me die.”

Kayla swallowed a sob.  “You what?” she whispered.

“I didn’t watch, I couldn’t see any of it, but I was there.  Inside my body.  The whole time.”  His voice was raspy as he fought to control it.

“This … this is the day you … this is October 23rd?”  Steve only nodded, the memory stinging the backs of his eyes.  “How?” Kayla asked shakily.  “How is that possible?  What are you saying?”

“I was paralyzed, Sweetness. That doctor gave me a drug to paralyze me, make it look like I was dead.”  This was news to Kayla; neither she nor Steve had ever known if he had truly died and been somehow revived later, or if he’d never actually flatlined in the first place.  “I couldn’t move a muscle.  I thought I was dying, I really did.  But then I realized I could still hear and feel everything.  I went through all of it, baby.  The whole thing.  I was awake the whole time.”

“But – I watched them shock you.”

“Yeah,” he chuckled without humor, “and it hurt like hell.  It was like someone shoved a live wire down my throat.”

“Oh, baby, no!” her tears flowing for the pain he must have endured.  “Steve, no!”

Finally, Steve couldn’t take it anymore.  His strength was zapped, and he fell to a sitting position against the skylight.  Kayla eased down to sit, as well, and leaned him up against her. 

“You’re hurt,” Kayla realized, worry etching her eyes.

“He gave something to me, Sweetness.  Shot me up with some kind of memory drug.  Said it would make me forget, but it’s not working like he thought.  It’s doin’ somethin’ to me, baby, ‘cause my head isn’t right.  But my memory is just fine.”

“Where?  How long ago?”

“My room in the ICU.”

“I mean where on your body did he inject you?”

“Neck,” he said woozily.  That made sense to Kayla, it was the quickest way to the nervous system short of a spinal.  “All of you were already gone, I couldn’t hear you crying anymore.”

Kayla took Steve’s hand, placed it against her heart, and held it there.  “You heard me crying?”

“I heard everything everyone said in that room, and a lot outside of it.  Felt it all, too.  Marcus lost it.  And you … I …”  His voice broke.  “I heard you cry and beg God not to take me.  Jack was there.  And then you got into that bed wth me …” Steve tried and failed to hold back his own tears, “… and I didn’t want you to go.  I was scared, Kayla, I really was.  I didn’t know what was coming ‘cause I don’t remember any of this.  I hardly remember that day at all, I only know what that guard on the boat told me.  But you were there.  Baby …”  The trauma of the terrifying experience was overtaking him, and he couldn’t control his emotions.  “I tried so hard to move, but my body wouldn’t work.  “Then …,”Steve’s voice started to weaken considerably. He felt himself slipping into blackness.   “…Marcus took you away.”

Kayla’s eyes were already hurting from the crying she’d done as new tears flowed.  “I’m here.  I’m here now.  You’re ok.”

“I killed Hopkins,” Steve blurted.

“What?”

“Dr. Hopkins.  The second one.  He’s the one that made it all happen.  Took me down to the morgue and left me there.  He was there on the boat when they were going to sell me to Dimera, too.  He was on Alamain’s payroll.  I killed him so I could get away.”  He said it with anger and not a shred of remorse.

“He’s dead?”

“He was alive when I left him, but there’s no way he didn’t bleed to death.”  He rolled his head up and looked at his wife.  “I won this time.  He’s the one who’s dead.”

Kayla brought his hand up to her lips and pressed them against it.  “Good.”

“Then I … I saw you … in the parking lot.  I wanted to go to you, but you drove away.  Hotwired a car and followed you here.  The other you. Waited for you to arri … arrive.” 

That was about it for Steve.  He was losing consciousness, and he knew it.  He leaned his head back against Kayla’s shoulder just as the door to the roof opened and Marcus came out.  He didn’t see them sitting on the floor at first.  How were they going to explain this?  Kayla didn’t have time to process exactly what the implications of this time were, where everyone was, and really even where the two of them were supposed to be.  Now she’d have to think of something fast, because there was no way to evade Marcus this time.

Steve saw Marcus walk through the door, but he had nothing left in him to be worried or shocked or to formulate any plans to avoid the conversation he was sure was going to ensue.  He certainly was in no shape to run.  No, Marcus was here, and Steve wasn’t sure what Kayla was going to say to him, but he did know that Kayla was going to be doing the saying, as he closed his eyes and passed out.  Kayla watched Steve lose consciousness and forced herself not to panic given the context of what he’d just gone through. 

When Marcus spotted them there he jumped out of his skin.

“It’s ok, Marcus!  It’s ok, it me, Kayla.”

“Holy shit, Kayla, you’re not the one that’s scaring the living daylights outta me.  How did you get Steve out of the morgue?!”  To say he was worried about his friend was an understatement; apparently, she’d just gone ape shit, and he started rationally going through the scenarios in his head of how he was going to get Steve’s body back into the morgue without implicating her.

“Marcus, I want you to calm down and trust me.  Steve got himself out of the morgue, because Steve’s not dead.”  Marcus just stared at her, so she tried again.  “Marcus feel his pulse.  Go on!  Feel it!” she demanded as she thrust his limp hand toward his best friend.

Marcus squatted down and very tentatively felt for the pulse in Steve’s wrist.  His face softened when he felt how warm Steve was and switched to his neck.  Then his jaw dropped when he felt the very obvious rush of blood travelling beneath his fingers.  He was so overcome with astonishment that he fell to his knees then into his own sitting position facing them both.

“Kayla, how?” he whispered.

“There’s no time,” she said getting up from the floor.  I know we’ve asked you for more help than we’ll have ever given you in your whole life, but please, you have to trust me right now.  We have to get him hidden right away.  He can’t be seen in public.  Can you hide us?”

“Hide you from what?”

“Please, Marcus!” she pulled him up.

“What about Stephanie?”

Stephanie … Baby Girl …  “She’s at my parents’.  I … I need her … for Steve.”

“For both of you.”

Kayla grounded herself and forced herself to think.  “One thing at a time, we’ve got to get him into a bed somewhere.  I don’t think he’s in good shape.”

“Of course, he’s not in good shape, for God’s sake, Kayla, he was in a coma 24 hours ago!” 

“Right.  Of course.”

“I’ll call an ambulance.”

“NO!  No, he can’t go to the hospital, we have to hide him!”

“What?!  Kayla are you out of your mind?  The man needs a hospital, and he needs it right now!”

“If you do that he’s as good as dead, and I won’t go through that again!  We have to hide him from Lawrence Alamain!  Please, Marcus, don’t argue with me! If you ever loved Steve, and I know you did, you have to just trust me!”  Kayla shouted this at him; he’d never heard Kayla like this, and she could see from the look he gave her that he was, frankly, stunned.  

Kayla pierced him with her sad, glassy, insistent eyes, and he knew whatever was going on, he just had to not let this miracle go.  His best friend, his brother, the only person on this earth who today loved him unconditionally, was given back to him.  Kayla continued looking at him with intensity as he took Steve’s hand in his.

“Yeah,” Marcus said with wonder.  “Yeah, no problem.  I’ll get you guys somewhere safe.”  Then he came back to himself.  “Did you find him this way?  What are his symptoms?”

Kayla went on to explain what he’d told her about the paralytic agent and the injected additional drug.  She explained exactly how he got there and who was involved, and she also explained that she wasn’t safe from Alamain’s men, either.  She didn’t consider or really care that that was knowledge she’d acquired after having lived several months and years beyond this point, she just needed him to have the information that would get them somewhere safe to treat Steve.  They considered several locations, including Shane’s house.  She knew that was actually the very best place for them to stay safe with their daughter, too, but she couldn’t take him there without consulting him; not now.  So for now they just stayed right where they were, there at the loft.  With Jennifer wrapped up in that mess in Lawrence’s country, she knew no one would be bothering her there. 

Marcus helped get Steve half conscious, and he and Kayla did their best to drag him into the loft.  He was forced to manage on his own down the spiral staircase, as two across wasn’t going to cut it there. 

“I love you, too, Homey,” Steve blurted out in his delirium.  “Tomb can wait, man.  And you can’t have my girl.”  Marcus had no idea what he was talking about. 

No sooner had they gotten him settled onto the bed of the guest bedroom that he promptly fell right back into unconsciousness. 

“No matter what happens, Marcus, no matter what you hear from anyone, you cannot tell a soul that Steve is alive and that you know where he is.  You can’t.  Do you hear me?  His life is in the balance.”

“Fine, I’m not gonna tell anyone, but you need to tell me right now what is going on here.  How did this happen?  Just tell me, Kayla, you can’t just leave me in the dark like this.”

“Do you trust me?”

“What the hell kind of question is that?”

“Do you?”

“You know I do.”

“Then trust me now.” 

Marcus didn’t like it.  Not one bit.  But he didn’t argue any further and just did what she asked.  He went back to his place, got all the supplies he was going to need to take care of Steve, as well as some clothes that weren’t going to fit him but would have to do.  Then he called over to the Bradys and told them Kayla was going to stay with him for the night, and could they keep Stephanie overnight.  Caroline agreed, of course.  Then he went to the Emergency Center to pick up IV kits, medications, and anything not covered in his bag.  An hour later he was headed back to the loft.

While Marcus was gone, Kayla got Steve out of the scrubs and changed the dressing around his ribs with the first aid supplies Jennifer had on hand.  She also covered his left eye with a gauze pad and some medical tape, knowing he hated having his eye exposed for any length of time.  She kissed his lips and called his name a few times, hoping he’d awaken, but he didn’t really rouse.  She started to cry when she saw his feet.  Filthy and scratched up from his barefoot run from the hospital and climb up the fire escape.  She got a bowl of hot, sudsy water and a washcloth, and began washing off his feet. 

“Remember when you did this for me the other day?” she asked his still form.  Was it really the other day, she wondered as she gently scrubbed the bottoms of his feet?  It seemed so long ago.  “How many weeks have we been gone, Steve?  Four?  At least a month, right?  I’ve lost track.”  A cut in Steve’s big toe started to ooze slightly, and she sprayed it with Bactine.  “My poor husband,” she said softly. 

Kayla then cleaned off the rest of him and tucked his naked body into the guest bed.  She was dozing lightly next to him when Marcus walked in.  Kayla sat up quickly as Marcus settled her and then began examining his best friend. 

“Heart rate’s a little fast.”

“Not too tachy, though, and it’s steady.”

“True enough, Dr. Johnson,” Marcus joked with a grin.  If only he knew.  Maybe he should know.  We might have to tell him.  Kayla didn’t have time to ponder whether or not this was a good idea or stupid one, because before she knew it, the IV was going into Steve’s hand as the bag of saline was set on fast drip.  Then he got out the smelling salts.  “If we can’t wake him, you know it’ll have to be a cath.”

Kayla nodded.  “He’ll wake up.”

As soon as Marcus waved the strong, ammonia-smelling capsule beneath his nose, Steve’s eyes popped open.  He jerked his head around to find Kayla sitting next to him on a bed he didn’t know, and Marcus standing over him with his hands on his hips.  He felt confused and disoriented.  “Kayla?!” he called out even though he saw her right there.  “Do you remember Stockholm?”  He was breathing erratically, and Marcus didn’t like it. 

“Stockholm?” Marcus asked.

“What is this,” Kayla came right back with, “20 questions?”

“Oh,” Steve exhaled.  “Baby …”  He reached for her, and she took his hand.

“Steve, we did this already, do you remember? The roof?”

“I saw you arrive.  You were – So sad, baby.  So sad.”  He had no emotional strength to keep the weepiness out of his voice.

“When did you jump in?” she asked as Marcus tried to follow the conversation.

“Right before I flatlined.  Last thing I said was that I love you.”  He touched her face, and the look upon it was so gentle he couldn’t take it.  He closed his eye and reached for his patch.  He found the bandages and looked back at her.  “Thank you, baby,” he said with genuine gratitude.  She smiled back and kissed his hand.

“I don’t know what you two are talking about, but Steve, you’re gonna have to pee pretty damn soon with those fluids we’re pumping into you.  There’s another bag right after this where that came from, and I want chicken broth in you first thing in the morning.  Somewhere between the second bag and that broth, you’re gonna tell me what the hell is going on here.”

Steve did what came naturally and lied.  “There’s nothin’ goin’ on, Homey, nothin’ you have to worry about.”

“Oh why don’t you just save it, man, it’s insulting.”

“Steve,” Kayla said softly, “I think we might have to this time.”  Steve gave her a look that clearly said he couldn’t disagree more, but the fact was that he wasn’t in a position to argue at the moment.  “For now, you just get better.”

Marcus slept on the couch while Steve and Kayla tried to sleep through the night.  He woke them four times to take his vitals and change his IV bag, and each time Kayla helped him to the small guest bathroom where the fluids had worked their way right through him until his bladder threatened to burst.

By morning Marcus was exhausted.  He removed the line from the now empty second saline bag but kept the lead into his hand so he wouldn’t have to stick him again if he needed more medication.  All that and Steve didn’t move. It was only when he put the blood pressure cuff around his friend’s muscular arm that Steve woke up quickly. 

“Kayla!”

“Shh, man, let her sleep,” Marcus whispered, but Kayla startled awake, anyway.

“Stockholm?” he said sleepily.

“Stockholm again?”

“20 questions,” she replied with the same relief that she saw spreading across her husband’s face.

“Ok,” Marcus said, “now that we’ve got that all established, it’s time for you to clue me in on your secret code and whatever the hell it is that’s going on here.”  Steve and Kayla unconsciously grabbed onto each other’s hands, lacing their fingers together.  There was a very expectant silence before Steve finally spoke.

“Lawrence Alamain faked my death.”

“And you know this how?”  Marcus didn’t wait for them to finish taking his blood pressure.  It was low.

“I just do.”

“Oh come on, man!”

“Homey, I’m feelin’ like shit, here, do we have to do this now.”

“Marcus,” Kayla interjected, “can we give him time to recover, please, he’s just been through something terrible.”

“Kayla, as far as your family knows, your husband died yesterday, and they are about to wonder where the hell you are.  Don’t you think you could use a little backup right now?”

He was right.  Kayla looked at her husband and squeezed his hand.  “We need to tell him,” she whispered.

Steve threw up his free hand and then ran it frustratedly through his hair.

“Marcus,” Kayla carefully began, “something is … happening to us.”

Marcus sat down on the side of the bed to face them.  “Ok, what?  What’s happening to you?”

Now that the moment was upon her to tell him, she had no idea what to say.  We’re from the future?  We’re jumping through time?  None of this is going to matter once we jump away because the timeline will reset to whatever it was in the first place and you won’t remember any of this?  How could she say any of these things to him?  She was going to sound like a lunatic.  She looked to Steve for help, but he was as lost on what to say as she was.

“We’re – we’re …”

“Marcus, we’re being chased by Lawrence Alamain for some reason, I have no idea what he wants with me.  I think he just wanted to get even with Bo for something, because the bomb was meant for him, but once they had me, they just went with it.  Kayla can’t go home, because they’re gonna be waiting there for her, they think she has something they want.”

“What?”

“A tape,” Kayla said.  “Implicating Lawrence.”

“That’s all we can tell you right now, because the rest of it we don’t really understand, either.  But we can’t tell my family I’m alive.  Not yet.”

Marcus took it all in.  Then he asked, “What was that Stockholm stuff?”  Neither one of them said anything.  “Come on, this is me!  You need me to keep your secrets, you know I will.  Now trust me with this!  What do you need this secret code for?”

“To make sure we’re who we seem to be,” Steve said.

Marcus tried not to sound like they were nuts, because that was clearly what was holding them back.  Did they think he didn’t know them well enough to have figured that out?  “Ok,” he said carefully, “and who else would you be but you?”

“We’d still be us, Marcus,” Kayla said, “we just might not be the – versions of ourselves,” she hedged, “that remembers our entire lives together.  We need to make sure we’re the us from two– we need to make sure we’re the whole us.”  She almost said from 2009, but she just couldn’t bring herself to do it.  Steve squeezed her hand as he carefully watched his best friend’s reaction; she did good.

Finally after a long silence, Marcus said, “That memory drug you mentioned?  It’s that memory drug?”

“Yeah,” Steve said too enthusiastically, he’s messin’ with our memories.”

“But we’re fine!  We’re ok now.  We’ll be fine, we know we’re the real us now – I MEAN THE WHOLE US NOW.”

Marcus nodded.  “Ok.  Man, I had no idea Hopkins was on the take.  God, Steve, I shocked you, myself, your heart stopped.”

“I don’t know what my heart was doing, but trust me, it was beating.  I felt those paddles.  Every one of them.”

“God, Steve.”

“And I was awake in there the whole time.  I heard what you said,” Steve told him softly.  “I’m so sorry, Homey.  I’m so sorry I put you through that.”

Marucs fought off tears.  “I’m just happy to have you back,” he said as he took Steve’s hand and then embraced him.  “Don’t ever do that to me again, ok?”  Steve felt a stab of intense melancholy with that statement, knowing Marcus would die well before his time, himself. 

“Yeah, ok,” he rasped.

Kayla was afraid to make any calls from here based on what she knew of Lawrence’s interactions with Jennifer, so Marcus called Caroline from his place, again, and said he’d come by to get Stephanie.  Steve couldn’t wait to see his daughter, and knowing she was going to come through that door any minute gave him strength.  When Marcus finally did appear with her in his arms Steve couldn’t help but cry. 

“Little Sweetness!  Oh, come here, let your papa hold you!”  Stephanie squealed, and Kayla looked at her baby girl with such overwhelming and deep love.  The last time she saw her was on their second jump, and it still moved her to see her at the babyhood stage again.  The reunion was beautiful, and Marcus left them alone to be with each other for the next hour.

Later, Marcus watched Steve, who continued to rest and recover, while Kayla called her mother from a payphone nearby and somehow made it through a long conversation assuring Caroline that she and Marcus were making all the funeral arrangements.  She had no idea if they’d be here long enough to actually have to deal with it, but she had to get her family out of the picture for the next few days by “grieving,” which made perfect sense.  She would never forget the day of Steve’s funeral, it was the Friday after he died. This time she pushed it to Saturday, wanting to give Steve an extra day to recover before they outed themselves.  If they were still there, then they wouldn’t be able to hide forever, and Steve needed to be as strong as possible.

Later that night, news of the murder of the touted doctor made it to the news channels.  Steve watched it from the couch and cursed Hopkins’ image as a number to call with any information scrolled across the screen.  “You rot in hell,” he seethed.

At 3am Steve woke to Kayla gently pacing with Stephanie in her arms and a bottle popped into her mouth.  She looked beautiful.  He hadn’t seen her with straight hair this long and this straight in quite some time, and it struck him that this was new time for them.  It felt calming.  Right. 

Kayla saw him sit up in bed.  “Sorry we woke you,” she cooed.  “Someone was hungry, weren’t you, Baby Girl?”

“Don’t be.  Feels good.”

“You need your rest.” 

Steve stared at Stephanie. “Can I have a turn for a minute, baby?”

“Of course you can,” she said and handed Steve his little girl.

Steve looked into her sleepy eyes as she fed from the small bottle and thought of how beautiful his raven-haired daughter was today.  Kayla caught his eye and smiled at him as she fingered the locket around her neck.  And for reasons he couldn’t begin to understand, the image of his wife sobbing uncontrollably on the roof entered his mind with such force that a guttural sound escaped his throat.  “Steve, what is it?!”

“You.  I was remembering the other day.  I was there the whole time you were on the roof.”  Kayla was silent.  She wasn’t sure what he was trying to tell her.  “I watched you cry.  Before you jumped in, I watched it.  It tore me apart.”

“Oh,” she said with dawning comprehension as she sat facing him on the bed.  “I don’t remember that night so well, but I was not myself.”

“Not yourself?  Baby you were not on this earth.  My whole life I’ve never seen you like that.”  He remembered Stephanie contentedly feeding from her bottle in his arms and changed his tone, though not his content.  “Mama scared Papa when he saw her that way,” he sing-songed, “didn’t she Little Sweetness?”  Stephanie shoved the nipple out of her mouth with her tongue and Steve held her close to burp her.  “Papa loves your mama so much that he couldn’t handle it, could he?”  Stephanie rewarded him with a burp and a gurgle.  She yawned as Steve kissed her, then he handed her to Kayla to put her back in her car carrier, which she set her on the opposite side of the room.  “My whole life, I’ve never seen you like that, Kayla,” Steve repeated softly so his daughter wouldn’t hear him. 

Kayla layed against Steve’s chest as he wrapped his arms around her.  “Losing you was the worst thing that’s ever happened to me,” she said.  I shut down.”

“I know that now.  When you told me you were broken I didn’t understand.  I do now.  I hate that I understand it, and I wish I could go back to never having seen you up there cryin’ so hard.  Baby … I didn’t know what it was like.  And with,” he took a deep breath, “Shane,” his name came out with difficulty, “with what you told me about how it was for you … seeing that up there?  Kayla, I don’t ever wanna see that again.”

“I’m sorry,” Kayla said.

Steve couldn’t believe the guilt he heard in her voice. “No, Kayla.  No,” he said with disbelief.  “I’m the one who’s sorry, don’t you see what I’m trying to say?  I put you through that.  It was the most horrible thing I’ve ever heard, those cries coming out of you.  Why should you be sorry, you’re not the one who put me in that morgue.  You’re the one who had to cope when I was gone.”

“Yeah, I was,” she said.  But part of me has always wondered since you came back if I could have prevented it.”  Steve looked down at her like she’d grown a second head.  “I just took at face value what they told me.  That you were dead.  That your heart had stopped.  I knew I saw a pulse in your neck, but I let them convince me that you were gone.”

“Kayla I remember being there this time.  I’m telling you, Hopkins covered all the bases.  Even the monitor showed that my heart wasn’t beating, baby.  And you’re gonna blame yourself?  What, you’re supposed to think the machine is lying?”

Kayla sat up from him and looked down at her sleeping daughter then back to Steve.  Her eyes were steel.  “I hate them.”

“So do I.  And I hate Dimera, too.  Or whoever’s doing this to us.”  Steve took her hand and placed it against his cheek.  “I didn’t know until I saw for myself just how broken you felt.”  He turned into her palm and kissed it.  “I watched you break apart up there.  I know now,” he said meaningfully.  

“Yeah, but you know what?  You were given a second chance with this jump.  You knew what to do this time, and you fixed it.  And look, now you’re here with us,” she smiled.  “Back on the right track.  You did that, not me, I was still in 1987 or that time tunnel or whatever.  But you’re our hero.  Because now our baby has her papa back.”

“I love you, Sweetness.”

“I love you more.”

“Oh, I doubt that,” Steve said with a sad smile.

The next day Steve was feeling so much better.  His vitals had all but leveled out, so Kayla removed the IV port.  Marcus had to go to work, so he left Steve and Kayla with Stephanie for the day.  He’d had the wherewithal to pick up a can of formula and rice cereal, as well as a few outfits for all of them from the house, so they’d been set for the short term.  There was nowhere for the baby to sleep, however, so she continued to sleep in her car carrier, and quite happily, too. 

Steve and Kayla had played with her for hours over the past two days.  She was their daughter, but she was also a bit of a novelty, too.  A bright, shining bonus that lit up the misery of not only this jump but the entire series of them beginning with that horrible boat.  There was no pain when they were with Stephanie.  No fear or doubt about what was happening to them.  It was all on hold when the beautiful, giggling little girl they’d made together was with them.  They took care of her and enjoyed every second she was there.  The mess they were in wasn’t gone, but the horror if it all had fallen away to the true joy of being a family with their baby daughter. 

This was not time Steve and Kayla were reliving; this was a brand new experience.  Unshared time that was now shared.  Nineteen years ago, Kayla was numb with grief in her parents’ home while Steve began the nightmare of his captivity.  This day, Thursday, October 25^th was not a day they’d previously shared.  For them, this was the first time around. 

Friday morning Steve woke up early.  He kissed his wife softly without waking her before he headed into the kitchen to get himself something to eat.  Marcus then slid open the loft door and smiled at his friend.  “Man, you look almost 100%.”

“I feel almost 100%, Homey,” Steve smiled.  Then the two of them went into their womb-to-tomb handshake. 

Marcus went silent, and his face took on a mask of seriousness.  “Don’t you ever leave me again, man.”

Steve looked into Marcus’s chocolate brown eyes and nodded.  “Thanks for taking care of Kayla.”

“I didn’t do any—”

“I know you don’t understand.  But you were there for her.  For years.  And I couldn’t ever say thank you.  But when I found out, it meant a lot to me.  I love you for it, Marcus.  You’ll always be my brother.”

Marcus swallowed the lump in his throat.  Steve was right, he didn’t understand what Steve was saying, but he had a feeling it had something to do with whatever the whole truth was that he knew damn well they weren’t telling him.  He could have pushed Steve, but he didn’t.  He just accepted it and nodded.  Happy for now to simply have his friend back. 

Marcus checked Steve over one last time and then deemed him healthy enough that he would have released him if this were a hospital.  He didn’t push when Steve didn’t have any details on whether or not they were going through with this funeral tomorrow or not and settled on getting an answer this evening.  Marcus then left for rounds at the hospital, and Steve shoveled in two slices of toast heaping with butter.

When he came back into the bedroom Kayla was still sleeping, and Stephanie was beginning to wake up.  He got her out of her carseat, and brought her into bed with he and Kayla, who curled her fingers into his growing stubble.  She then kissed Stephanie’s belly, and the baby let out a stream of happy giggles.  They sat in bed as a family just like they did with Joey every morning, minus the breastfeeding.  Steve looked into Kayla’s eyes, and they knew they were each thinking of Joe at home, though neither one verbalized it.

Right after their daughter went down for her morning nap, which neither of them wanted to truly put her down for, Kayla cleared Steve to take a shower.  She felt that whatever drugs were in his system were now gone and that he wasn’t going to topple over in there and hit his head.  Of course, Marcus had already done all that, but she needed to check him over herself.  The water felt so good, so cleansing of all the horror he’d just been through.  He wanted to stand beneath that hot stream all day.  A stream that Kayla had stood under a couple hours earlier.  Thoughts of her naked body suddenly electrified him, and his longing for her after those previous terrible jumps made him ache.

When he came out he left his left eye exposed and walked naked to his wife.  Kayla reacted immediately, licking her lips and locking her eyes intensely upon his.  Steve didn’t say anything at first.  There were no words, just intensity and immediate understanding.  He ran his hands through her hair and his thumb across her bottom lip. 

“You’re still recovering.”

Steve didn’t acknowledge her; instead he very slowly began to strip her clothes off one by one.  She thought to herself that this was far too early after his ordeal to be doing anything physical, including any kind of sexual activity.  But all it took was his strong hands gently cupping her breasts as he kissed her deeply for her to let go and feel him there.  They hadn’t made love or been intimate in any way since he’d found she and Shane on the pier.  She’d needed this for days, and her heart quickened at the purity of the look in his eye.  Kayla ran her hands across his broad back and felt the muscles ripple beneath her fingers as he undressed her.

“I’m sorry for everything, Kayla,” he whispered.  “I’m sorry for all of it.”  He kissed her so gently, and she could feel how much he meant what he was saying.  “I love you so much.  I almost lost you.  And I’m so sorry.”

She knew that he was talking about their rift over the last several jumps.  “I did the wrong thing, too, Steve.  I’m sorry, too.”

He put a finger to her lips.  “What you went through.  I had no idea what it was like for you.  I just …”  He gathered her up in his arms and held her tightly.  “Sweetness … Sweetness …”

“No more secrets, Steve.  I’m so sorry I hurt you.”

“Shh, kiss me.”

“I love you,” she moaned into his kiss.

Kayla felt Steve’s erection stiff against her belly.  Steve’s bare body and bare face were laid open for her, and now she was as naked as he was.  They wrapped themselves in each others arms and when he slid into her, she cried out with the sensation.  Finally, her husband was home inside of her, their marriage was safe, and they were together in a time that originally stripped them apart.  Kayla felt her ring on her finger where it belonged as Steve gently glided into her warm, wet sheath. 

“Kayla,” he moaned.  “Kayla … I love you, Sweetness.  Thank you for my life.” 

“Thank you for our life,” she said breathily as he took her breast in his mouth and sucked gently on her alabaster skin.  He swirled his tongue around her nipple, and Kayla moaned in rising ecstasy.  Her orgasm was building, and Steve started to pump faster.  For a moment she worried he wouldn’t have the stamina after the traumatic physical ordeal, but he showed no signs of weakness. 

“You feel so good.  Kayla, baby, you feel so good.  I missed you.”  He thrust into her with growing intensity.  He wanted to pour himself into her and never leave.  Joining with her was the best medicine he could be given.  Physically and emotionally.

Kayla felt how much he loved her with every insistent stroke against her clitoris.  His tongue on her felt like velvet as his lips sucked at her stiff peaks and his penis continued to thrust into her.  Which is why when she felt the tug in her gut so fiercely it took the wind out of her.  Steve felt her reaction and stopped moving.  

“Sweetness?”

“I just felt the jump,” she said quickly.  She couldn’t help but cry.

Steve instinctively held on to her as if that might keep her there.  “Dammit!”  It was the second time they jumped during sex, and he was just as angry and frustrated this time as he was the last time, but he was also relieved to be getting out of this hellish jump, too.

She kissed him fiercely and he kissed her back in equal desperation.  “Find me, Steve!  Please find me!”

“I’ll always find you baby,” his voice broke as he looked into her beautiful eyes beneath him and lovingly tousled the hair out of her eyes.

“Stephanie!” Kayla shouted, surely waking up her baby napping outside the door.  “Your mommy loves you,” she sobbed.  “I love you!  Both of you,” she whispered to Steve as she felt herself falling away into wherever she was going next. 

Steve watched her go as her eyes fell into a stiffened blank stare.  He was still inside of her.  He knew he was going in just moments.  He refused to pull out of her.  He rested inside of her and kissed her unresponsive lips.  “I love you,” he whispered as he kissed her again.  Then he called out, “Don’t cry, Little Sweetness!  Papa loves you, too!”  Then he felt his own pull and jumped, too.

The last thing Kayla felt and heard was her husband still inside of her and the faint sounds of her daughter’s cries as Steve looked into her eyes.  When she felt him start thrusting into her again she felt momentary relief.  But he was pumping into her now so much harder and faster than he’d just been making love to her, and the room was darker.  And he felt different.  Immediately and completely different … wrong … “Steve?” she called to him.

He stopped his brisk pumping very abruptly at the sound of her voice, and in that very moment Kayla knew even before her eyes adjusted.  She screamed and pushed him off of her with such force that the man on top of her went tumbling to the floor with a hard thud.  The face that stared back up at her wasn’t Steve’s. 

“Bloody hell, Kay,” Shane huffed, “what the devil’s gotten into you?!”

Chapter Text

Find Me
Chapter 58

Kayla wildly gathered the bedcovers up over her naked body and scrambled up against the head of the well-dressed canopy bed.  The moment she’d arrived she knew something was off.  She was thrown a bit, because she’d just left the act of making love to Steve.  So when she arrived to the very same act, expecting it to be him yet feeling something different, she was caught completely off guard.  Especially now – of all the times she could have jumped here.  Now she sat curled up in a tight ball with the comforter drawn up to her chin as she began to shake.  Her mind was racing, and guilt tore through her as she felt their combined fluid on her thighs.  The smell of sex permeated her nostrils as it hovered in the air.  She felt sick, and it wasn’t just the jump effect. She couldn’t breathe.

“Kay!” Shane repeated from his position naked on the floor. His tone was angry with the initial shock of being physically pushed out of her and on to the floor.  But now that his coital stupor was dissipating and he took a good look at her, Kayla saw the look in his eyes turn from anger to terrible concern.  He knew now that something had happened.  Something very bad had just happened.  He didn’t know what, because not ten seconds ago everything was fine.  But, now she was somewhere completely different, and he didn’t have a clue as to why.

“Kayla?” he said far more gently.  Kayla heard the distinct change in Shane’s tone, the gentle lilt of his voice reaching out to her … and it made her recoil even more.  Please God, let me jump!  Please get me out of here!  Her eyes darted around the room to try to get her bearings.  Without much thought she’d established that this was Shane’s house, and given what they’d just been doing, it must be late 1991 or maybe 1992. 

This was not happening.  This could not have been more cruel.  Of all the places she could have jumped, it had to be not just to a date with Shane or kissing Shane, it had to be having sex with Shane?  Underneath all the feelings that were causing her to go mute and feel shock and guilt, there was an underlying current of something … contrived.  All their jumps had been random as far as they knew – certainly, as far as they felt. But this one?  It felt a lot less random than the rest.  The feeling was fleeting in the wake of the gravity of her situation, so it came and went for the moment.

“Kay, are you alright?” Shane tried again.  “What’s happened?”  He’d started to stand up, and she knew she had to get out of there.  Right this very minute she had to get out of that room.  Before he could make it to a standing position, Kayla bounded out of the bed and made a naked sprint to the bathroom.  From the time her foot touched the floor to the moment the dark cherry wood door slammed behind her lasted no more than three seconds, but it felt like so many more.  It felt like a lifetime of exposure. 

It was pitch dark in the bathroom, but she found the light switch quickly.  She flicked it on and gasped at the visage looking back at her from the full mirror above the sink.  Kayla’s blonde hair was very short, spiky mess.  If this were not so shocking a jump she would have been struck by how thin she was, her collarbone much more prominently displayed than in quite some time.  She looked away from her breasts very quickly so that she wouldn’t have to look at the smattering of small red splotches on them.  “Shit, shit,” she whispered to herself.  “Why am I here?  This isn’t fair.  This just isn’t fair.”  That’s when she startled at the insistent knock at the door.

“Kay, what is going on?” Shane asked with unequivocal concern in his voice.  “Are you alright?”  When she didn’t immediately answer Shane continued.  “Did I hurt you?  Please answer me, Kay, you’re scaring me!”  She was frozen as she wrapped her arms around herself and stared at the door.  “Kayla!”  Now Shane’s voice was very insistent.  “If you don’t answer me I’m going to break down this door!”

“Please don’t!” she finally answered. 

“Are you hurt?  Or sick?”

“N-No.”  She heard him sigh in frustration on the other side of the bathroom door and forced herself to get a grip.  Deep breaths, Kayla.  Just calm down.  Every instinct she had was to run, but the concept of where to run to was too big for her in these disturbing moments.  Her first order of business was to get dressed.  So, Kayla inhaled deeply and forced herself to focus.  “Shane,” she began very softly and with a calm that belied the emotions roiling inside of her, “Can you give me something to put on?”

“So, you’re alright, then?”

“I’m fine.”

“Then please just tell me, Kay, what is it?”

“Shane.  My clothes.”

“Yes … yes, of course.”  Shane quickly slipped on a blue robe, then a moment later Kayla opened the door a crack so he could hand her hers.  It was the black one with the white lace at the collar.  The familiarity of it grounded her.  She hugged it to her as a child would a stuffed animal, then tied it around herself.  “Look, I just want to help you.  If I did something, or didn’t do something, or-or touched you wrong—“

“You didn’t do anything, Shane.  It’s not you.  Please just give me a minute,” she replied from behind the door.”  Kayla leaned straight arms on the sink, lowered her head, and said a prayer that Steve would arrive soon.

Kayla’s head shot up.  Steve’s not here.  “Oh my God!”  The reality of it all hit her in the face.  Her heart began racing again, and a cold shiver ran down her spine.   

“What?!  Kay what is it?”  Shane was sounding very insistent on the other side of the door.

Kayla was now thinking very clearly.  She could have trembled some more.  She could have broken down and sobbed.  But somehow the gravity of the situation her husband was now in focused her into one tightly driven purpose. 

Steve would not be coming to find her, because Steve was currently an unwilling guest of Stefano Dimera somewhere in what she could only guess was Italy.  She shuddered at the thought of what was happening to her husband right now.  Was he being conditioned?  Tortured?  Forced to say things, do things … forget things … ?  “Steve,” she said out loud as her heart sped up again.  “I’m the one who’s going to find you.” 

Suddenly, a spate of places Steve had rescued her from assaulted her memory.  Orpheus, the Deveraux house, Harper on the plane, Victor’s in Miami; then it finally settled on an image of Steve’s soaking wet face as it looked at her with love and relief when he pulled her out of that Stockholm storm drain.  It electrified her.  Fired up her resolve.  Kayla looked at herself in the mirror and saw that determination growing exponentially by the second.  She had had enough.  She had absolutely had enough of the constant pace of harrow.  Of uncertainty since being ripped from her home.  Of feeling like an actor trying to recreate her own story.  Steve was going to be out there somewhere.  He might already be out there somewhere.  And she was tired of feeling like a victim in this whole insane, impossible whatever the hell it was.  She knew what she had to do, she needed Shane to do it, and she wasn’t going to take no for an answer.  “Hang on, Steve.  I’m going to find you, and we’re going to get out of this.”

It had gone quiet in the bedroom, which is why when Kayla came barreling out of the bathroom Shane had to jump back to avoid being run over.  Kayla didn’t waste any time.  She didn’t like where she’d jumped to, but it was time to get over it and get her husband.

“Shane!  Shane, listen to me.  I know this is going to sound completely crazy, but—but—it’s—something’s happened.”

“What?” he asked holding her by a shoulder and cupping her cheek with his other hand.  “What’s wrong, are you ill?”

Kayla stiffened but kept calm while gently taking his hand from her face and holding it in her own two clutched out in front of her.  “No, I’m not sick, just listen.  Please listen very carefully.”  She saw the look on his face change when she rejected his touch, but she couldn’t focus on that right now.  Her only focus was on making Shane understand what they had to do, and she was so desperate to do it that it all came pouring out of her with barely a pause to breathe. 

“This is going to sound crazy, I know that.  But – and there’s no other way to say this – but Steve is alive.” She paused for only a moment to gauge his reaction, which wasn’t much more than a mask of confusion just yet – and quickly continued.  “Lawrence Alamain faked his death, he never really died!  He was awake in there the whole time, in his body, I mean.  While the doctors worked on him, he could hear and feel everything.”  By now Shane had dropped her hands, and she’d immediately begun using them in animated gestures meant to drive home her words and convince him they were true.  “It’s just that he was drugged by Dr. Hopkins, he was working for Alamain and actually sold Steve to – I mean he IS working for him.  And – wait, what day is this?  We …” she quickly did the math in her head as she turned and paced with the sudden energy of a firecracker.  “Summer’s over, right?”  She combed her fingers through her hair again, even though she already knew what she’d find.  “Right.  So, Steve’s already been sold, Hopkins might not be working for Alamain anymore, but he’s still a lead!  He set the whole thing up with the drugs – Steve woke up in the morgue the same day he died, then he escaped!”  Kayla stopped there and swayed nervously.  She tilted her head slightly and squinted in thought, correcting herself in short, clipped phrases.  “Only—only he’s not going to escape, because – because he didn’t this time – because it didn’t stick – did it?  None of it stuck, SO WE HAVE TO DO IT ALL OVER AGAIN!   Shane, we can’t wait.  He’s suffering!  He wouldn’t let me suffer like that, and neither can I.” 

The whole thing just came pouring out of her in a manic string of breathless verbosity.  She looked at Shane and knew he had no clue what she was talking about. By now he was sitting on the bed and holding his chin between a bent knuckle and his thumb.  The concern in his eyes didn’t escape her.

“I sound crazy.  I know.” 

Shane crossed his arms and pulsed the muscle beneath his temple, casting his very wary eyes upon her. 

“Shane?”  She crossed her own arms in front of her and stuck out her chin with a fortitude that was steadfast.   “Would you please say something?”  He blew out his breath.  He didn’t say anything, because he wasn’t sure what to say.  “Steve is out there!”

Shane finally found his voice.  “Steve is dead, Kayla.”

“No, he isn’t.  I know this is a shock, and I know it sounds crazy, but it’s not like Stefano hasn’t—“

“Stefano?  Kayla, you just said it was Lawrence Alamain.”

“It was,” she whined, the breadth of the explaining she had ahead of her seemed daunting.  “But by now Stefano has him.”  Then for some reason she felt the need to confirm that the events of their jump to the pier had really reset.  “Shane, do you remember rollerskating with me?”

Shane wondered what that had to do with anything but answered her.  “Of course, I do.  Why?”

“Was Steve there?”

Shane stood and grabbed Kayla by the shoulders.  “Steve is gone, Kayla.  He wasn’t any more alive then than he is now.  Now I want you to snap out of this!  I don’t know what’s going on with you, but I don’t mind telling you that you’ve got me terribly worried, here.”

How could she make him understand?  She had to make him understand, because they were wasting time!  She clasped her hands in front of her and plowed on.  “Look, you have to trust me.  You need to call the ISA.”

“Ok, now I know there’s something wrong with you if you want me to involve the ISA.”

“It’s the only way to find Stefano.  I don’t know exactly where Steve is now, I only know that he was sold to Stefano when we were on the pier.”

“What pier?”

“Rollerskating.”  Kayla wiggled out of Shane’s grasp and checked that her robe was still tied securely.  Then she blew out her breath.  “It doesn’t matter, look – well, maybe it does.  I – I must have kept a calendar, right?  I could look up the date.  I …” then she backtracked.  “Just listen to me!  We need to go to the ISA and find Stefano, because if we find him we’ll find Steve.  I know it, Shane.  I know it.”